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XI-XII 



THE LAND SYSTEM OF THE NEW 
ENGLAND COLONIES. 



JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY STUDIES 

IN 

Historical and Political Science 

HERBERT B. ADAMS, Editor 



History is past Politics and Politics present Wmtorj.— Freeman 



FOUETH SERIES 



XI-XII 



The Land System of the New England 

Colonies 

/ 

By MELVILLE EGLESTON 




BALTIMORE 

N. MUEBAY, PUBLICATION AGENT, JOHNS HOBKINS UNIVERSITY 

November and December, 18S6 









COPYKIGHT, 1886, BY N. MUKKAY. 



ISAAC FKIEDENWALD, PBINTER, 
BALTIMOBE. 



PREFATORY NOTE. 



The following monograph was originally printed in the year 1880. 
Of the copies then issued some found their way at once into the 
larger public libraries, while others were placed in the hands of 
persons believed to be interested in the subject treated of. The 
number of these copies, however, all told, was quite small, and it 
was suggested some time ago by the editor of this series of "Johns 
Hopkins University Studies" that the results of the writer's investi- 
gations were not accessible to many to whom they might be useful, 
and that they were. of sufficient interest to warrant their publication 
in the series named. 

The opportunit}^ courteously ofiered by him of reaching in this 
manner a greater number of persons interested in studies of the kind 
was gladly accepted, and the treatise is now reprinted, without any 
change whatever from the original form. 

The author has deemed it important to make this explanatory 
statement, for nothing but the facts which have been mentioned 
could excuse, or even account for, the absence of reference to the 
numerous and valuable studies in the history of local institutions 
which have been published in this country during the past six years. 

M. E. 

New Yoek, November 1, 1886. 



THE LAND SYSTEM OF THE NEW 
ENGLAND COLONIES. 



The laws of a State are the reflection of the economical and 
social condition of the people, while their form and spirit 
indicate the mental and moral status of those by whom the 
laws are made. They are thus among the most valuable 
and trustworthy sources of historical information which we 
possess. Especially is this the case where the people are 
themselves legislators. Yet the history of American legisla- 
tion has not received the attentive study which it deserves, 
and which will surely some day be given to it. I have here 
subjected to examination a small portion of this interesting 
field. The close connection between the institution of laud 
in any community and its political and social history is now 
well understood, and the importance of such an investigation 
as I have here undertaken will, I think, be recognized, how- 
ever successful or unsuccessful the writer may be in his treat- 
ment of it. 

I have endeavored to trace the origin and early history of 
our existing land system — a system than which none has yet 
been devised better suited to the conditions of any people. A 
complete presentation of the subject might well contain a 
fuller account of the laws of alienation and succession ah 
intestato than has been given ; but it seemed best for several 
reasons to consider them separately in another place. Enough 
has been given, however, for the present purpose, and the 
land system of New England was mainly determined by the 
legislation and customs here described. 



6 The Land System of the New England Colonies. [550 

In explaining the process by which the soil of New Eng- 
land was distributed among the occupants, I have followed 
what seemed to be the natural order, stating first the origin of 
rights in the land, and then describing successively each link 
in the chain of title, grants from the Crown, grants from the 
Great Council, colonial grants, and finally the division of 
lands among the members of the land communities. Local 
ordinances and recognized customs have been treated as 
important parts of the system. 

I. 
ORIGINAL SOURCES OF TITLE. 

1. — Right of the Ceow^s^. 

In the New England colonies all titles to landed property 
were derived originally from an actual or constructive grant 
of the English Crown. The title of the Crown itself was 
based upon that union of discovery and possession which, in 
the opinion of English jurists, could alone give a valid title 
to a new country. Mere transient discovery indeed amounted 
to nothing unless followed in a reasonable time by occupa- 
tion more or less permanent under the sanction of the State. ^ 
But these conditions, it was held, had been fulfilled by the 
discovery of the coasts of America by the Cabots in the years 
1497-8, and the subsequent visit of Sir Humphrey Gilbert 
in 1583, when he formally took possession of the country 
under letters-patent. Long as was the interval, it was in the 
eyes of England not too long, and that nation always based 
and maintained her claims to possessions in America upon 
the grounds here given.^ 

The rights of the Crown were not merely those of the head of 
a State, or of the feudal lord paramount. The King was the 



' 3 Kent Comm. 380, n. 

^ Ibid., and Tburlowe, State Papers. 



551] The Land System of the New England Colonies. 7 

immediate owner and lord of the soil, and exercised unlimited 
power in the disposition of it. He made grants which could 
not be made under English law, as, for instance, when he 
authorized the proprietaries of Maryland and other colonies 
to erect manors, " anything in the Statute of * Quia emptores ' 
to the contrary notwithstanding/^^ He claimed also the 
right to establish local governments, and conferred powers of 
legislation upon his grantees, whether these were colonists in 
America or groups of courtiers in England. The rights of 
private ownership and royal prerogative were in him too 
closely combined to be readily distinguished. 

2. — Right of the Aborigines. 

But although it was the theory of the British Government 
and of the colonists that the absolute, ultimate title to land 
was in the sovereign, that title was subject to a right of occu- 
pancy in the Indians. This natural right of the natives w^as 
entitled to protection ; but the sole right of acquiring it by 
purchase or by actual conquest was in the Crown or its 
grantees, and the natives had no right to dispose of it to any 
other .^ 

The colonial governments uniformly acted upon these 
principles, so that, although individuals w^ere disposed to deal 
less liberally with the natives, and even such a man as Cotton 
Mather deemed it unnecessary to recognize in any way their 
title,^ the rights which the theory of the Government left to 
them received, as a rule, the protection required. 

In Maine, owing to peculiar circumstances, the title con- 
veyed by Indian deeds assumed especial importance, and a 
high degree of authority was accorded to such evidences of 
property. At about the time of the English Revolution, the 
colony of Massachusetts was striving vigorously to extend 

Hazard, State Papers, I. 160, 327, 442, etc. 
-3 Kent, 379, etc. 
^Magn. I. 72. 



8 The Land System of the New England Colonies. [552 

its boundaries, and, in order to weaken its enemy Gorges and 
render him unpopular, the colonial government supported 
the theory that the native right must be superior to that con- 
ferred by such an extensive patent as his. Purchases from the 
Indians, which in consequence became frequent and of great 
extent, were regularly upheld by the local courts.^ When 
Massachusetts in 1716 appointed commissioners to record 
claims to lands, these Indian deeds were revived with other 
claims, and thus gained a standing as legal titles. The 
Government, however, became alarmed at their extent, and 
in 1731 passed an act forbidding all purchases from the 
natives without license of the Legislature, and declaring all 
deeds taken without such license to be null and void.^ ' 

This enactment was merely an extension to new territory 
of a policy abeady generally adopted in New England. Mas- 
sachusetts herself had in 1633 passed a restrictive law apply- 
ing to the territory then held by her.^ Plymouth had done 
the same in 1643,^ and Connecticut made similar regulations 
at an early date.^ 

That these laws were enforced is abundantly shown by the 
constant formal authorization of purchases,^ as well as by the 
recorded cases of refusal to confirm purchases made without 
authority.'' A grant of land, indeed, carried with it the right 
to extinguish the Indian title as of course, and no special 
authorization was needed. Yet even then, if the conditions 
of the grant were not fulfilled, the Government claimed the 
acquired title, if the planters had purchased.^ 

Not only was the necessity of acquiring the Indian title 
uniformly recognized, but in some cases, especially when be- 

1 Sullivan, Land Titles, 43. 

2 Acts and Res. of Mass. Bay. 
2 Mass. Rec, I. 112. 

^Plym. Rec, Winslow's letter in Hazard, II. 531. 

5 Conn. Col. Rec, I. 214, 364, 402. 

6 Mass, Rec, II. 82, III. 225, etc. ; Conn. Rec. I. 151, 418, 420, etc. 

Uhid. lY. 427, 430, 440, etc. 

Ubid. XV., Pt. II. 529. 



553] The Land System of the New England Colonies. 9 

yond the boundaries of an acknowledged local government, 
the colonists would seek no other titles, contenting themselves 
with that derived from the natives, without confirmation or 
authority from any other source. Roger Williams even took 
the ground that the planters could have no just title except 
what they derived from the Indians, in consequence of which 
heresy he was summoned before the court, and was also con- 
demned by a council of ministers.^ But in the settlement of 
Rhode Island his principles were strictly followed, and it is 
possible that no grant would have been sought there, except 
at the hands of the actual possessors of the soil, had not some 
formal authorization of their acts of self-government been 
found essential to safety. Parliamentary and royal grants 
were then obtained. 

Connecticut was settled and its government organized 
without any charter or grant, and the lands were purchased 
by the planters from the Indians as they had need of them. 
Mr. Trumbull says, " The settlers of the river towns had not 
— before or after the agreement with Mr. Fen wick — any right 
of jurisdiction, except such as grew out of occupation, pur- 
chase from the native proprietors, or (in the case of the Pequot 
territory) of conquest.'^ Their policy seems to have been to 
dispose as quietly and as cheaply as possible of the claims 
of such as challenged their title, into the exact nature of 
which they were not disposed to provoke too close an inves- 
tigation.^ But the General Court, as early as 1638, was given 
the sole power to ^^ dispose of lands undisposed of,^^ and 
regularly exercised the power. ^ 

The titles to land in Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard 
originally were derived merely from Indian deeds, although 
the islands were soon placed under the jurisdiction of Massa- 
chusetts by the Congress of the United Colonies, and in 1692 
were regularly incorporated by royal charter into the province 

1 Arnold, Hist, of R. I., I. 279. 
•^Conn. Rec, I. 569. 
^Ibid. 25, etc. 



10 The Land System of the New England Colonies. [554 

of Massachusetts Bay.^ Titles from the Crown were also 
acquired through the Earl of Stirling. 

A careful examination of the records will satisfy a candid 
inquirer that there is no ground for materially modifying the 
statement of Chancellor Kent that "the people of all the 
New England Colonies settled their towns upon the basis of 
a title procured by fair purchase from the Indians with the 
consent of Government, except in the few instances of lands 
acquked by conquest after a war deemed to have been just 
and necessary.'^ ^ Even where the title had been regularly 
acquired by purchase, the General Court of Massachusetts 
spoke of the native right as one "which cannot in strict 
justice be utterly extinct," and refused to dispossess the In- ' 
dians, although it gave compensation in other lands to the 
town interested.^ 

II. 
ROYAL GRANTS. 

No fruitful attempts at colonization were made under the 
letters-patent granted to Gilbert, and after his death to his 
half-brother, Raleigh. But the zealous persistence of the 
latter, and the remarkable success of English merchants en- 
gaged in trading to distant lands — especially in connection 
with the operations of the famous Muscovy Company — pre- 
pared the minds of men for an enterprise in another quarter 
which promised great results, and, indeed, secured them, 
although not in the precise way expected. Gosnold's expe- 
dition in 1602, under the auspices of the Earl of Southamp- 
ton, of which glowing reports were made by him and his 
companions on their return, was the immediate forerunner 
of a movement which resulted in the procurement of a charter, 

^ Sullivan, 38, 55. ' 
2 3 Kent Comm. 391. 
3 Mass. Rec.,IV. Pt. II. 49. 



555] The Land System of the New England Colonies. 11 

and the subsequent colonization of the coasts of America 
under the encouragement of its provisions.^ 

The Chaetee of 1606.^ 

The letters-patent issued in 1606 to Sir Thomas Gates and 
others granted to them the territories of America between 
34° and 45° of north latitude, or from Cape Fear to Halifax, 
together with all islands within one hundred miles of their 
shores. The patentees were to divide themselves into two 
distinct companies, one of which, afterward called the Lon- 
don Company, w^as to have an exclusive right from 34° 
to 38° north, while the other, the Western, or Plymouth 
Company, was to have control between 41° and 45° north. 
TJie intermediate space was open to colonization by either. 
The London Company was dissolved by quo warranto in 
1624. But it was not until 1635 that the Plymouth Com- 
pany ceased to exist, and even then the surrender of its 
charter was voluntary.^ 

The Chaetee of 1620.^ 

Before any successful attempt at settlement had been made 
by the Plymouth Company, it was, with some changes of 
membership, made a separate body politic and corporate, 
under the name and style of ^^ The Council established at Ply- 
mouth, in the County of Devon, for the ^planting, ordering, ruling, 
and governing of New England in America. ^^ ^ The charter 
of 1620 granted to the new corporation certain territories, to 
be called New England, extending between 40° and 48° north 
latitude, and from sea to sea ; to be held " as of the manor 
of East Greenwich in free and common socage. ^^ It gave 

' Graham, Col. Hist, of the U. S., I. 44, etc. 

2 The Charter is in Hazard, State Papers, I. 50. 

3 Palfrey, Hist, of New England, I. 81-2, Hazard. 

4 Hazard, 1. 103. 

5 Palfrey, Hist, of N. E., I. 192. 



12 The Land System of the New England Colonies. [556 

also rights of legislation and government ; yet nothing came 
of any attempts to exercise these rights, for deep hostility to 
the patent was soon manifested, and from this, together with 
other causes, the difficulties of the situation became so great 
that the company in 1635 surrendered its charter to the 
King.^ It did not, however, do this until after making a 
number of grants, which, from ignorance or carelessness as 
to previous conveyances, and the want of accurate knowledge 
of the geography of the country, were, in the words of Sulli- 
van, " but a course of confusion. ^^ ^ Among these grants, 
about which there has been so much dispute, were some of 
importance, from the fact that through these is traced the 
title to a great part of the soil of New England. These ' 
grants will, therefore, be more particularly described here- 
after.^ 

Geant to Gorges. 

Another royal grant was made in 1639 to Sir Ferdinando 
Gorges,^ conveying a tract of land called the Province of 
Maine, lying between the Piscataqua and the Kennebec, and 
extending inland one hundred and twenty miles, from which 
the whole State of which it is a part has taken its name. 
All necessary powers of government were included in the 
grant, and its tenure was in free and common socage. But 
this grant was at an early date assailed by settlers, and 
indirectly by the government of Massachusetts Bay, which, 
in order to weaken its enemy, supported the theory that 
the native right was paramount to such an extensive patent. 
Titles from the natives were produced and were strongly 
upheld, and it is said by Sullivan that what was not taken 
from Gorges' patent by other means, was generally swal- 
lowed up by Indian deeds.^ 



1 Graham, Col. Hist., I. 183. 
- Land Titles, 36. ' 

2 See p. 15, post et seq. 

4 Sullivan's Land Titles, 42. 
' Ibid. 43. 



667] The Land System of the New England Colonies. 13 

Eventually, in 1677, the province was sold by the grand- 
son of Gorges to Lieutenant-Governor Usher for the use of 
the Colony of Massachusetts Bay.^ 

" TJie Incorporation of Providence Plantations, in the Narra- 
ganset Bay in New England/' received its charter from the 
Parliamentary Government of England in 1644. Its charter 
from the King was granted in 1663.^ The grant of lands 
covered substantially the territory of the present State of 
Rhode Island, which had already been occupied by settlers 
under a government established by themselves. 

" The Governor and Company of the English Colony of Con- 
necticut , in New England in America/' were incorporated by 
royal charter in 1662.^ The territory granted comprised 
what is now the State of Connecticut, and also a part of New 
York. Parts of it were already in the hands of settlers 
belonging to the Connecticut and other plantations. 

The royal province of New Hampshire was constituted in 
1680, the chief justices in England having decided that the 
title and jurisdiction were in the Crown, subject, however, to 
the vested rights of John Mason in the soil — a reservation 
which rendered land titles in that province for many years 
uncertain.^ The territory subsequently reverted to the juris- 
diction of Massachusetts for a short time, but from 1692 it 
remained a separate province.^ It included, as was claimed, 
the territory now known as Vermont. Grants both to 
individuals and towns were made by the governments 
successively in power. 

The country called Sagadahoch, lying between the Penob- 
scot and the St. Croix, the possession of which had been long 
contested by the English and French, was, by the charter of 
1692, placed under the jurisdiction of Massachusetts, and 

^ Willis, Hist, of Portland, 239, and Hutchinson. 

•^Arnold, History of R. I., I. 114, 284. 

3 Trumbull, Hist, of Conn., I. 259. 

*See documents printed in Belknap's Hist, of N. H., I. Appendix. 

« Graham, Col. Hist., I. 244-5. 



14 The Land System of the New England Colonies. [558 

that province had authority to grant the lands. But if the 
King did not consent to a grant within two years after it was 
made, it became void. By the same charter the Province of 
Maine (lying between the Piscataqua and Sagadahock) was 
incorporated with the Province of Massachusetts Bay.^ 

The rights to land conveyed by these royal grants were in 
all cases substantially the same. The tenure was, as of the 
manor of East Greenwich, in free and common socage, and 
not in capite or by knight service ; the conditions, fealty, and 
the payment for rent of one-fifth part of the gold and silver 
ore. 

The effect of the provisions relating to tenure has been 
generally, and in some cases strangely, misunderstood. But ' 
to discuss the subject fully here would require too much 
space. It must suffice to say that the tenure was not more fa- 
vorable than, and not different from, that established by grants 
of lands in England of that period, and even of much earlier 
date.^ The words " as of the manor of East Greenwich '^ 
were used, not with reference to the customs of that manor, 
or of the County of Kent (gavelkind, etc.), but simply to 
negative the otherwise necessary inference that the grant was 
to be held in capite, or, to speak more accurately, ut de corona,^ 
which would have carried with it some disadvantages under 
the feudal law. The words " not in capite " add nothing to 
the substance. The tenure, however, was undoubtedly as 
favorable to the grantees as it could well be made. 

' Sullivan, Land Titles, 45, 55 ; Maine Hist. Coll., I. 239. 

'■^I have met with several grants of the kind made by Queen Elizabeth, 
one as early as 1560. Madox, Hist, of the Exchequer, I. 621. History of 
Surrey, M. & B., I. 356, 357. 

2 Lowe's Case, Bacon's Works, IV. 238, etc. 



559] The Land System of the New England Colonies. 15 

III. 
GRANTS OF THE COUNCIL FOR NEW ENGLAND. 

The title to land in New England is traced through the 
Great Council for New England, which in 1620 became seized 
of the whole territory, and at the time of surrendering its 
charter, in 1635, had already granted a great part of its lands, 
and taken steps for a division of the remainder among its lead- 
ing members.^ But the division was not perfected, and the 
ungranted lands again came into the possession of the Crown. 

The confused and careless way in which the grants of the 
council were made has been already spoken of. The subject is 
exceedingly complicated, and entire accuracy could only be 
attained, if at all, by a long and tedious investigation. But 
for the present purpose, fortunately, such accuracy is not 
necessary, as only a few of these grants are of importance 
either in tracing the title or illustrating the tenure of lands. 

Disregarding the grants that were forfeited or abandoned, 
those which failed to obtain judicial support, those which were 
substantially confirmations of previous grants, or which 
covered too little territory to be described here, we find six 
grants which deserve particular mention. These are : 

1. In 1621, a grant to John Pierce, said to have been for 
the benefit of the Pilgrim colonists.^ This was rather in the 
nature of an agreement to convey than an actual grant of 
definite territory.^ 

2. In 1628, a grant to Sir Henry Roswell and others of 
the territory afterward known as that of Massachusetts Bay, 
which will be more fully described elsewhere.'^ This grant 

^ Lowe's Case, Bacon's Works, IV. 238, etc. 

^ This is the common theory. But the language of the charter, and of a 
deposition by Samuel Welles, published in Maine Hist. Soc. Coll., I. 38, 
make it doubtful, and tend to show that the settlement under it was on 
the coast of Maine. 

2 Haven, Grants under the Great Council, etc. 

4 Sullivan, Land Titles, 48. 



16 The Land System of the Neiv England Colonies. [660 

was followed two months later by a royal charter confirming 
it and granting powers of government.-^ Under an interpre- 
tation afterward held incorrect, parts of New Hampshire and 
Maine were comprised within its limits. 

3. In 1628, a grant to William Bradford and his associates 
of territory intended for a fishery of the Colony of New 
Plymouth, extending fifteen miles on each side of the Ken- 
nebec, and up the river to Cobbiseecontee.^ This tract was 
conveyed to the freemen of the colony in 1640, and by them 
in 1661 sold to Tyng and others for X500. It was afterward 
known as the "Kennebec Purchase.'^ ^ 

4. In 1629-30, a grant to Wm. Bradford and his associates 
of the territory afterward known as that of the Colony of 
New Plymouth ; and also of the territory on the Kennebec, 
already granted in 1628.^ 

5. In 1630, a grant to Beauchamp and others, called the 
Muscougus grant, of a territory thirty miles square on 
Penobscot Bay and Eiver. This was afterward known as 
the " Waldo Patent,'' and is still held by the heirs or assigns 
of the grantees.^ 

6. In 1632, a grant to E. Aldworth and G. Elbridge of 
the Pemaquid tract of 12,000 acres, and 100 more for every 
person transported within seven years. This is still held 
under title from their assigns.^ 

In 1629, a large tract was granted to John Mason between 
the Merrimac and the Piscataqua, afterward known as New 
Hampshire. A tract called Mariana, extending from the 
Naumkeag Eiver (Salem) to the Merrimac, had been previ- 
ously granted to him.' Lands throughout this territory were 

^Mass. Rec, I. 3, etc. 

^Gardiner, Hist, of Kennebec Purchase, in Maine Hist. Coll., II. 275, 
etc. 

^Gardiner, Hist, of Kennebec Purchase, in Maine Hist. Coll., II. 276. 
Sullivan, Land Titles, 40 (where the latter date is given 1655). 

4 Plymouth Col. Kec. 

5 Sullivan, Land Titles, 44. 
^Ibid. 

'Belknap, Hist, of N. H.,IIL App. 



561] The Land System of the New England Colonies. 17 

settled and granted without regard to Mason's asserted rights ; 
but the controversies about them played a great part in the 
political and social history of the colonies for a long time. 
These controversies were not settled until 1746, when 
Mason's representative finally conveyed his remaining rights 
to twelve persons, sometimes spoken of as the Masonian pro- 
prietors. The proprietors quit-claimed on easy terms to 
settlers, and made grants for towns without claiming any 
quit-rent, and often without fees.^ Mason's heirs, through 
one Allen, made claims as late as 1790, but the matter was 
practically disposed of long before that time.' 

A few other grants have been sustained, but they do not 
seem to have aifected the prevailing systems of tenure. This, 
indeed, is true also of some of the grants enumerated above ; 
but they have been noticed here merely as the sources of title 
to extensive tracts. 

The lands in New England which had not been alienated 
at the time of the surrender of the company's rights in 1635, 
are included in grants of the Crown already mentioned.^ 

IV. 
COLONIAL GRANTS. 

General Provisions. 

The territory under the jurisdiction of Massachusetts Bay 
included not only the original grant to the company, but 
also, during the more important part of their history, the 
territories of Maine, under its various names, and of Plym- 
outh. The colony also claimed for a time the southern part 
of New Hampshire, and exercised powers of government 
there. It made itself felt for a long time in Phode Island, 
and gave to the emigrants of Connecticut their first authority 

' Belknap, II. 205. 
'Ibid.lU.U', N. H. Rep. 31. 
'See page 13, ante. 



18 The Land System of the New England Colonies. [562 

to form a settlement. 'Not was this all. Owing to the 
ample privileges of the charter, the intelligence and the pros- 
perity of the people, its land system was developed more 
fully, and at an earlier date, than those of the other colonies. 
Superior numbers, wealth and power secured for its legisla- 
tion and established usages in this, as in other matters, a 
marked influence upon the law and customs of all New 
England, so that the land systems of the other colonies, as they 
were successively developed, took substantially the form of 
that of Massachusetts Bay. 

In addition to all this, it must be remembered that a great 
part of New England was settled directly by emigrants from 
the Bay, and in other cases the planters were men who had at 
least remained long enough in that colony to become acquainted 
with its institutions, and to learn to look upon them as 
natural and necessary under the new and strange conditions 
of the country. 

For our purpose, therefore, a careful examination of Massa- 
chusetts laws and customs is by far the most important and 
useful ; while in regard to other colonies it will be necessary 
to notice only those points in which their systems differ from 
that which may properly be considered the typical system of 
New England. 

Following this line of inquiry with sufficient care, we may 
hope to gain a clear idea of the body of rules relating to land 
which prevailed in this part of our country, guiding its settle- 
ment, and deeply influencing its civilization. 

Oeders of the Company in England. 

On the 5th of March, 1629, a committee was appointed to 
consider a method of dividing lands so as to " avoid all con- 
tention twixt the adventurers.'' The subject was debated by 
the company a few days afterward, and referred to a new 
committee.^ The plan finally adopted was as follows r 

Mass. Rec, I. 30, 34. 
Ubid. I. 43, 43, 44, 363. 



563] The Land System of the New England Colonies. 19 

1. Each adventurer (or shareholder) of X50 in the com- 
mon stock was to have two hundred acres, and holders of 
other amounts in the same proportion. 

2. Every adventurer might, personally, or by his servant, 
request the Government to allot him land. If this was not 
done within ten days, he might occupy any land not already 
improved, not exceeding one-half of his share. 

3. But if the town plat was made, and known publicly, no 
one was to build elsewhere (except in Massachusetts Bay, 
under direction). And if his lot in the town plat was not 
assigned him within ten days after application, he might 
build anywhere within the plat, and improve half an acre for 
each XoO of stock, unless otherwise directed as to quantity 
by the Government. 

4. Adventurers who went, or sent others at their own 
charge, were to have fifty acres for each person transported. 
Persons other than adventurers going at their own charge, 
with families, were to have fifty acres for the master of the 
family, and such further portion, '^ according to their charge 
and quality,'^ as the Governor and council might determine, 
unless otherwise agreed. 

5. Conveyances under seal were to be made by the company 
to such as desired it. 

6. If a settler disliked a place taken by him under Section 
2, he might choose within the allotment whenever dividend 
was made.^ 

In the case of colonists who were not adventurers in the 
common stock, the company held it fit that " they should 
hold and inherit their lands by services to be done on certain 
days in the year,*' as a good means "to enjoy their lands 
from being held in capite, and to support the plantation in 
general and in particular." - 

^ The dividend here referred to may indicate an intended general distri- 
bution by lot to all the adventurers. See letter to Endicott in 1629, Mass. 
Kec, I. 391. 

2 Letter to Endicott, May 28, 1629, Mass. Hec, I. 405. 



20 The Land System of the New England Colonies. [564 

There was a reason for making a distinction between the 
adventurers and others, for the common stock bore at first all 
the public charges, fortifications, support of the ministry, etc. 
This form of tenure, however, does not seem to have been 
established.^ 

Up to this point the regulations might have been those of 
any trading company, made with a view to the careful man- 
agement of the common property. But the request made in 
a letter to Endicott, the company's agent in America, that he 
would "accommodate such as wish to have their lands 
together," shows already some consideration of the social 
needs of the settlers. - 

Another order was made for the benefit of the stockh older, ^7 
when, owing to losses, it became necessary to reduce the 
amount of the joint stock by two-thirds ; it was then agreed 
that the old adventurers should have in compensation " a 
double portion of land, according to the first portion of two 
hundred acres, for ^50."^ Later, when an increase of stock 
was needed for general purposes of the colony, it was ordered 
that land should be allotted at the same rate, according to 
the sums subscribed.* 

Whether intended or not, the result was that grants under 
these provisions could not well in any case be large enough 
to form great estates and so interfere with the natural growth 
of settlements. There was no temptation as yet to hold 
lands with a view to an advance in price ; no way of making 
a grant profitable, except by "improving " the lands granted. 
And it was long before this ceased to be true. 

The restrictions as to the place of settlement were wise 
precautions against such a state of things as gave so much 
trouble to the Dutch of New Netherland, where, for a time, 
this point was neglected. 

^ Young, Chronicles of Mass. Bay, 187. 
2 Mass. Rec, I. 309. 
Ubid, 64. 
^ lUd. 68. 



565] The Land System of the New England Colonies. 21 

Orders after the Coming of Winthrop. 

It is quite possible that up to the time of the transfer of 
the company to America, a division of the land was contem- 
plated which would have entirely frustrated the purpose of 
these judicious rules, and perhaps have caused the failure of 
the whole enterprise.^ But, fortunately, the rules had been 
for some time in force when Winthrop came to the Bay, and 
the wisdom of their spirit had abeady become evident to 
those engaged in the establishment of the new State. The 
general division was not made, and the rules were observed 
by the new Government. Before the transfer of the company 
to Massachusetts Bay in 1630, grants were probably made by 
the company's representative in America in accordance with 
his instructions,- but afterward all grants were made by 
the General Court, and were generally made upon petition.-^ 

At first, all islands were reserved and appropriated to the 
public benefit, to be let and disposed of by the Governor and 
assistants,^ and, accordingly, many leases of islands were 
made, both to towns and individuals.^ But at a later day 
they were granted like other lands. All swamps containing 
about one hundred acres were to lie in common.^ But with 
these exceptions all lands were available for grants, either to 
plantations or individuals. 

The estate granted was generally a fee without reservation. 
But in a very few cases grants were made for life, or other 
term, and upon payment of rent.^ 

Before making a grant, the court appointed a committee to 
view the desired land and report as to its suitableness.^ The 

'Mass. Rec, I. 391, 
Ubid. 391, 40b. 
•' Ibid, passim. 
' Ibid. I. 89. 
''Ibid. 94, 104, 115, etc. 
'Ibid. I. 111. 

' As in the case of some of the islands jast mentioned. 
'^ Mass. Kec. ; Conn. Rec. passim ; but not when the grant was to an 
individual. Yet see Conn. Rec, I. 359. 



22 The Land System of the New England Colonies. [566 

order for a grant sometimes gave the intended boundaries/ 
but it usually only indicated the locality, and but rarely 
(except when made to an individual) mentioned the quantity 
of land.^ 

The order for a grant sometimes named a committee to lay 
it out/ otherwise such a committee was subsequently 
appointed at the request of the grantee.'^ The latter course 
was more usual, and the committee, after " laying out " the 
grant, submitted their report to the court, whose confirmation 
of it was essential.^ But committees did not always do their 
duty. In 1634, it was found necessary to appoint a general 
committee to set out the bounds of towns not yet set out, or 
in dispute f and in the grant made for Sudbury, in 1656, it 
was provided that the grant should be void if the committee 
named did not make return to the next court of election/ 

Care, too, was taken that the bounds thus granted should 
be well surveyed, and the lines preserved. In 1641, it was 
ordered that every town should set out its bounds within a 
twelvemonth after they were granted;^ and in a case of 
gross neglect by a town, the court upheld the title of one who 
had in good faith laid out a farm within the limits of the 
grant.^ 

The committees were expected to take cognizance of the 
usual provision that the land should not be laid out '' to the 
prejudice of other grants ''; and in grants to individuals, the 
description was often " where he may find it without prejudice 

^ As in Endicott's and Cradock's. Mass. Rec, I. 97, 141. 

-Mass. Rec; Conn. Kec. 

3 Diimmer's grant, Mass. Rec, I. 141. 

* As in Endicott's ; ibid. II. 259. 

^ Jbid. passim. 

^ Ibid. J. 125. 

' Ibid. IV. 264. 

^ Ibid. I. 319. In 1647, towns were also required to perambulate their 
bounds every three' years. Mass. Rec, II. 210, In Connecticut it was 
to be done every year. Conn. Rec, I. 513. 

3 Mass. Rec, IV. 368. 



567] The Land System of the New England Colonies. 23 

to any plantation, made or to be made.^'^ Yet it will be 
noticed that grantees had but a very limited range of choice, 
and that grants were for some time confined to the immedi- 
ate vicinity of Massachusetts Bay. And when settlements 
were authorized beyond Cape Ann on the eastern coast, it 
was probably with a definite purpose of anticipating the 
threatened movements of the French in that quarter ; perhaps, 
also, of Englishmen, who were strangers to the undertaking of 
the Bay colonists.^ 

All these provisions relating to land grants sufficiently 
indicate the watchful care that was exercised by the Govern- 
ment. The purpose, evidently, was not to make individual 
settlers rich in lands, nor even simply to dispose of land to 
those who would actually occupy and cultivate it all. But 
the resources of the company were to be used in building up 
a compact State of freeholders, covering a territory ample for 
the requirements of comfortable living, and nothing more. 
No inducement, no excuse, was to be given for a loose, an 
isolated mode of settlement, which w^ould have enfeebled the 
political development of the colony, and left it at the mercy 
of its enemies, or, at best, dependent upon the protection of 
England for its very existence. 

Y. 

COLONIAL GRANTS— (Conti-s-ued). 

Grants to Private Persons. 

Although the leading provisions relating to this subject 
have already been given as applying to all grants of public 
lands, the grants made to individual settlers during the first 
period of the colony's existence merit attentive examination. 
We will first consider the extent of grants, as a thing deeplv 
affecting the whole question of land tenure. 

' Mass. Rec. passim. The Johnson grant -^vas exceptional : III. 189. 
2 Winthrop, New England Hist., I. 99. 



24 TTie Land System of the New England Colonies. [568 

The first grant to a private person appearing in the records 
of Massachusetts Bay is one of 600 acres to Winthrop, in 
1631, and it is the only entry for that year. In 1632, there 
were six grants, averaging 148 acres each ; in 1633, one 
grant only of 50 acres. In 1634, the number rose to nine, 
including one of 1,000 acres to Haynes. The average, how- 
ever, was only 383 acres. A large tract was granted in 1635 
to Cradock (formerly Governor), extending " a mile from the 
riverside in all places " ; and there were two other grants of 
500 acres each, besides that of Taylor's Island. In 1636, 
there was a grant of 1,000 acres to Saltonstall. In 1637, 
Dudley received 1,000 acres, and there were two or three 
small grants besides. In 1638, there were fourteen grants, 
including one of 1,500 acres, which brought the average up 
to 372 acres for the year. 

At this time a committee was appointed to report on all 
applications for lands, and in 1639 there were twenty-three 
grants, averaging 360 acres each. But after this time the 
number of grants is much smaller. The wants of the leading 
men had been provided for, and all others were referred to 
the towns. Thus in 1640 there were but five grants, and the 
same number in 1641. In 1642 and 1643, there were three 
each; in 1644, one; in 1645, two ; in 1646 and 1647, none. 
But in 1648 there were five — three of them, however, in the 
Pequot country^ — in 1649, again five; and in 1650 there 
were two large grants. One of these was to the executors of 
Isaac Johnson, 3,200 acres, in consideration of his large 
"adventure in the stock.'' The other, of 3,000 acres, to Sal- 
tonstall, was in lieu of a former grant. In 1651, 1652 and 
1653, there were three grants each year ; in 1655 there was 
but one; in 1656 there were six. Thus, during a period of 
twenty-five years, there were little more than one hundred 
grants, the largest being those to Isaac Johnson's representa- 
tives (3,200 acres), Mr. Nowell's (2,000 acres),^ Mr. Salton- 

^ Even this was ordered to be laid out *' in two or three farms." Mass. 
Rec, IV. 282. 



569] The Land System of the Nev) England Colonies, 25 

stall's (3/200 acres in all), Mrs. Winthr op's (3,000 acres)/ and 
Governor Cradock's tract. John Winthrop received 3,000 
acres in the Pequot country. Very few of the others received 
above 500 acres, and most of the grants were not more than 
one-half so large as that." 

It will be noticed that these grants were made to the men 
most prominent in the history of the company and of the colony 
— many of them magistrates and clergymen. In many cases 
they are expressly said to be in consideration of the ^^ adven- 
ture " of the grantees or their ancestors, and we may safely 
assume that most of them were so. 

But after the first few years we find a new class of grants, 
made in consideration of services rendered to the colony, 
moneys disbursed for it,^ or else in encouragement of under- 
takings likely to be beneficial to it. So, at a very early date, 
we find that the grant to Mr. Eaton, a teacher, is on condition 
that " he continue his employment with us for life.'' '^ E. Raw- 
son's is on condition that "he go on in the business of 
powder."^ In 1641, Stephen Day received a grant, '^ being 
the first that set upon printing."^ Goodman Stowe's, in 
1642, was ^'for writing the laws.'" A large grant was made 
in 1645 to the owners of iron works for mining;® and in 
1648, one was made to J. Winthrop, Jr., on condition of his 
establishing salt works on Massachusetts Bay.^ In 1651, 

' This was made at a time when large voluntary contributions were made 
by towns and mdividuals to relieve the Governor's financial embarrassment, 
caused by the unfaithfulness of his bailiff. Winthrop, N. E. Hist., II. 3, 
Savage's note. 

- The statements in regard to the grants of each year are made from a 
careful examination of the colonial records for the whole period, and are 
believed to be accurate. 

3 Mass. Rec, III. 413. 

^ Ibid. I. 2^2. 

''Ibid. I. 2G3. 

Ubid. I. 344. 

Ubid. II. 14. 

8/H(Z. II. 125. 

Ubid, II. 343 : Conn. Rec. I. 410. 



26 The Land System of the New England Colonies. [570 

Governor Endicott received one, on condition that he set up 
copper works.^ Others received large grants for services in 
arranging the relations of settlers to the eastward/ and in the 
Peqiiot War/^ etc. Of these was Mr. NowelPs grant, already 
mentioned ; and there were a number of grants of this class, 
from 300 acres to 500 acres, given for ordinary civil services 
of different persons. 

For some grants no cause or consideration is assigned, but 
it is fair to assume that these, like others, were either for 
services rendered, or, in the earliest years of the colony, for 
shares in the "adventure." 

In the particulars mentioned, the early land systems of the 
other colonies were in substantial agreement with that -of 
Massachusetts, except that in some (e. g., in Connecticut) 
there was greater freedom in regard to place of settlement. 
In the territory now known as Maine, the large grants from 
the Crown, and from the council at Plymouth, made an 
apparent exception to the rule of small holdings which pre- 
vailed elsewhere. Yet these large estates were not the result 
of the institutions of the country, but, on the contrary, were 
looked upon with disfavor by the people of the colonies, and 
with difficulty maintained among them. The transplanted 
feudalism of Gorges found no nourishment in the alien atmos- 
phere of his own settlements, and many grantees would gladly 
have seen the breaking up of their estates. But the scarcity 
of settlers, and the confused state of titles, prevented the sale 
of lands. The great grants of Maine were doubtless an 
injury to the province, and hindered its development, but 
they have probably had no other effect upon the prevailing 
land system than to obstruct its natural working in the ter- 
ritory covered by them, which was in consequence to a great 
extent left waste. 

A careful husbanding of vast agricultural and other resources 

^Mass. Rec, III. 256. 

2 Ibid. III. 339. 

3 Conn. Rec, I. 70, 208, 408. 



571] The Land System of the New England Colonies. 27 

in the interest of the whole commonwealth ; a methodical 
occupation of its territory, involving great restraint upon the 
individual wills of settlers, with a view to the greatest safety 
and prosperity of all; an avoidance of even the beginnings 
of great accumulations of landed property, are the clearly 
marked features of the early system of grants to private per- 
sons, and the same things will again appear in examining the 
history of grants to communities. 



YI. 
COLONIAL GRANTS— (Continued). 

Grants to Communities. 

It has been shown that, during the earlier years of the 
colonies, grants to individuals were small in number and in 
extent, and w^ere made either on the ground of interest in the 
stock of the company, or of services rendered to it. But by 
far the greater part of the land disposed of was granted to 
communities of settlers, who were sometimes members of 
some existing community, sometimes men who had never 
lived in the country, grouped together from various causes. 
The formation and development of these communities con- 
stitute one of the most important chapters in the history of 
the political and social institutions of New England. 

To what' extent the formation of land communities in the 
colonies was connected with the existence of similar institu- 
tions in ancient times in England and on the Continent, is 
an interesting question. The studies of Maine, Maurer, 
Nasse and Laveleye, have showai that the village community 
is probably a primitive Aryan institution, and the researches 
of Nasse especially have shown how much of it has survived 
in English law and in English life. It is possible that at the 
beginning of the seventeenth century some features of the 
earlier land system no longer in actual existence were yet 



28 The Land System of the New England Colonies. [572 

known to the people of the west of England, by tradition or 
otherwise, and certainly some traces of the ancient system 
were familiar to all even then.^ 

Old habits of thought survived, too, in the customs of the 
manor and the burgh, and especially in the parish; and, 
doubtless, similar economical conditions tended to produce 
similar social institutions. 

It is not possible to adequately consider the subject in this 
place, nor, indeed, has it as yet been sufficiently investigated. 
But the resemblance between the land communities of New 
England and those of the Old World is certainly too striking 
to be overlooked. 

" In the true village community,'' says Maine, " the village 
itself is an assemblage of houses, contained, indeed, within 
narrow limits, but composed of separate dwellings, each 
jealously guarded from the intrusion of a neighbor. The 
village lands are no longer the collective property of the 
community ; the arable lands have been divided between the 
various households ; the pasture lands have been partially 
divided ; only the waste remains in common." ^ This would 
be recognized, by any one acquainted with the early history 
of our towns, as a very good description of them. Some 
other remarkable correspondences will be noticed in the 
course of this essay; but whatever may be thought of their 
importance, the consciously provisional nature of the land 
community in this country must not be lost sight of. 

The immediate cause of the formation of these communities 
is more easily discovered. When men came in ship-loads 
from the mother country, large grants of land were called for, 
and those who had been neighbors in England naturally 
wished to be together in their new homes. ^ Emigrants from 

^Nasse, liber die Mittelalterliche Feld-gemeinschaft in England, and 
see evidence cited by Maine in his ** Village Communities." 

-Early History of Institutions, 81. 

^Mass. Rec, I. 399. The Dorchester church was formed in England. 
Weymouth people came from England with their minister. Winthrop, 
K. E.,I. 163. 



573] The Land System of the New England Colonies, 29 

the older settlements, too, were often kept together in a body 
from the same fact of former neighborhood, and often formed 
a genuine colony of some older plantation.^ The importance 
of local church relations, and the need of mutual protection, 
were always strongly felt, and the sentiments of the whole 
body of colonists favored the settlement of the country by 
" plantations." 

Efficient measures were taken to secure good organization 
and good management at the outset. In the oldest settlements 
the leading members of the Government were leaders also in 
their respective towns, and general legislation for a time was 
not needed. But the principles of the founders of the colonies 
required that new plantations should be managed in strict 
subordination to the interests of the whole, and this they 
accomplished by the aid of various provisions connected with 
the grants. 

To this end, in addition to the measures already mentioned, 
committees were named to take charge of the allotment of 
lands and the admission of inhabitants, thus insuring con- 
formity to the policy of the Government. So, in 1634, 
AVinthrop, Humphrey and Endicott were ordered ^^ to divide 
the lands at Ipswich to particular persons as in equity they 
shall think meet." - When the settlement of Hampton was 
authorized, it was ordered that nothing should be done with- 
out allowance of a commission consisting of Messrs. Bradstreet, 
Winthrop, Jr., and Kawson.^ The same thing was done in 
the cases ofSudbury,^Nashaway^ and other plantations,^ and 
it became the general practice. That it was not -always done, 
may be due to the fact that the court was careful not to 
authorize new plantations unless they w ere to be in a measure 

' Thus Winslow was a Dorchester colony ; Woodstock was settled by 
men from Roxbury, etc. 
2 Mass. Rec, I. 136. 
UUd. 236. 
^Ihid.l.'m. 
5 Mass. Rec, II. 136. 
® Sometimes in Conn.; see Conn. Rec, I. 414 ; 71, etc. 



30 The Land System of the New England Colonies. [574 

under the influence of men in whom confidence could be 
placed, and commonly acted upon their application. When 
such leadership of the undertaking was secured, the court 
was ready to give its sanction and its aid. 

The earliest settlements in Massachusetts Bay had, so far 
as appears in the records, no formal authorization. They 
were so near to each other that all questions could be dis- 
posed of by common agreement or the word of the magis- 
trate ; but they soon crystallized into a number of separate 
communities. 

In 1633, reports that the French were attempting the 
colonization of the coast to the eastward excited apprehen- 
sion, and it was decided that a plantation should be begun ^t 
Agawam (Ipswich), " lest an enemy, finding it void, should 
possess and take it from us.'^^ Two months later, John 
Winthrop, Jr., with twelve others, went there to begin the 
settlement,^ and the General Court then ordered that no 
others should go there without its leave.^ The next year a 
committee of the court was authorized to allot lands within 
four miles of the village.* This was the first plantation in 
New England made under the auspices of any colonial 
authority. 

A year later (1634) the pressure for land began to be felt 
at the Bay, and the colonization of the interior and the remoter 
seacoast began — a movement which, although stronger at 
some times than at others, was thenceforth practically con- 
tinuous. 

The inhabitants of ISTewtown (Cambridge) were the first to 
complain for the want of land, and, obtaining leave of the 
court to seek some convenient place, they sent men to Aga- 
wam and Merrimack to report.^ Some also went to visit the 

'Winthrop, N. E.,I. 99. 

Ubid. 101. 

3 Mass. Rec, I. 103, 

'^ See ante, 29. 

^"^Mass. Rec, 1. 119 ; Winthrop, I. 132, 



575] The Land System of the New England Colonies. 31 

Connecticut River, and at the next court they asked leave to 
remove thither. The subject was long and earnestly debated, 
but the adverse vote of the assistants for the time prevented 
the giving of the desired authority.^ 

The next year some of the leading men of Ipswich were 
allowed to form a plantation at Newbury/ and a company of 
twenty-one families from England, with their minister, was 
authorized to form a plantation at Weymouth, where there 
was already a small settlement.^ 

The state of aifairs in England was rapidly growing worse, 
and immigration to this country was in consequence greatly 
increased. Grants were made for plantations at several places, 
not far from existing settlements. But the time had come 
for the occupation of more distant points, and preparations 
were made for emigration on a large scale from the planta- 
tions of the coast. 

In urging their request for permission to remove, the 
petitioners had set forth the fruitfulness and commodiousness 
of the region, and the danger of leaving it to be possessed by 
others, Dutch or English."^ The latter was a strategic reason, 
which doubtless had its weight (as in the course of the settle- 
ment of Ipswich).^ But the principal attraction was, without 
doubt, the prospect of abundant provision for cattle in the 
great meadows of the central valley. The colonists had much 
live stock. AVood says, in 1634, that they had " 1,500 head 
of cattle, besides 4,000 goats, and swine innumerable. '^ ^ 
Lechford also speaks of the " good store of cattle,'^ ' and it 
appears that the transportation of cattle, horses, etc., with 
Winthrop cost £12,000.' The neat cattle carried to New 

^ Winthrop, 1. 140. 

''Ibid. I. 160 ; Mass.Rec, I. 14G. 

UUd. I. 163. 

^ Ibid. 140. 

•^New England's Prospect, 54. 

■^ Plaine Dealing. 

^ Josselyn, Two Voyages to New England, 132. 



32 The Land System of the Nao England Colonies. [576 

Plymouth in 1624 throve and increased exceedingly,^ and in 
1642 there were already 1,000 sheep.^ It is evident, there- 
fore, that live stock was very abundant, and in our climate 
a supply of hay as well as pasturage is so essential that 
Wood, in describing towns, always mentions that they " have 
hay-ground '^ ; but we know now that his accounts of unlimited 
sources of supply were exaggerated. We cannot be surprised, 
therefore, to find that the course of settlement follows the line 
of wide alluvial valleys, especially those of the Connecticut 
and its tributaries. Rich meadows were the main object of 
the emigrant's desires, and this accounts for the order of set- 
tlement of different places. It explains, too, why the orders 
for grants frequently directed ^ (and seem always to have im- 
plied) that the tract granted was to comprise both upland 
(including timber) and meadow^, thus supplying all the wants 
of the community. This practice was followed by the planta- 
tions in allotting lands and regulating their use. 

The extent of grants made to communities is a point of 
interest, both because the lands thus came into the hands of 
a definite number of persons, and were also for the most part 
soon divided among them, and also because of the political 
subdivisions which were based upon them. 

As to the extent of grants, we have seen that at Ipswich 
the lands were to extend four miles from the town. There 
were other cases where tracts of eight miles square were 
granted — e.g.y Groton,'' Mendon,^ and the grant on the Saco 
River for Newbury^ — and a ten miles' square was offered to 
Captain Hawthorne and others proposing to make a settle- 
ment forty or fifty miles west of Springfield. On the other 

' Josselyn, Two Voyages to New England, 146. 

2 New England's First Fruits, 39. Winthrop, I. 160. The Dorchester 
colonists lost near £2,000 worth of cattle the first winter in Coiiu. Win- 
throp, I. 184. 

3 Mass. ■Rec.,'1. 156. 
*i6icZ. III. 388. 
5J6icZ. IV. 445. 
Ubid. i02. 



677] The Land System of the New England Colonies. 33 

hand, some of the oldest towns were quite small; but in gen- 
eral a tract six miles square, or its equivalent, was thought 
of the best size for a plantation. As to its relation to the 
number of planters, we find, in the case of Groton, that a com- 
mittee of the General Court thought that the tract was large 
enough for sixty families, which would have given them over 
one square mile each.^ But the report of the same committee 
shows that this was not looked upon as the permanent limit 
of population, and we are told by Winthrop that ^^ a principal 
motive which led the court to grant * * such vast bounds 
was that when the towns should be increased by their chil- 
dren and servants growing up, etc., they might have place 
to erect villages where they might be planted, and so the land 
improved to the more common benefit.'^ ^ 

Many villages grew up within the limits of the older 
plantations, and eventually became separate towns. Thus 
Charlestown originally (until 1641) included what afterward 
became the towns of Maiden, Stoneham, Wobum, Burling- 
ton, Somerville, West Cambridge, Medford, and part of 
Cambridge.^ Many plantations received additional grants 
for the express purpose of enabling them to form new villages. 
Thus, in 1639, land was granted to Salem for a new village"* 
(afterward Wenham), and the next year Shawshin (Billerica) 
was granted to Cambridge for the same purpose.^ Dedham 
also received additions which became Wrentham and Med- 
field.^ And so in other places. In 1683, a tract in the 
interior eight miles square was granted to Roxbury, which 
when settled received the name of Woodstock (Conn.).' The 
granting to towns of tracts at a distance for settlement sub- 
sequently became a common practice. The settling of a 

iMass. Rec, IV. 9. 

sWinthrop, N. E.,IL 254. 

3 Brook's Hist, of Medford, 2. 

4 Mass. Rec, 1.279. 

'Ibid.d'SO. 

^ Annals of Dedham. 

■' Ellis's Hist, of Roxbury, 73. 



34 The Land System of the New England Colonies. [578 

new plantation was a very important matter, and was form- 
ally resolved upon and prepared for by the mother town. 
The Scituate people who settled B^Aistable, when expecting 
to go to Sippecan, "prayed for direction in electing commit- 1 
tees for setting down the township.'' ^ The land was spme- 
times sold by the proprietors in the old town to the settlers^ 
Thus, Dedham in 1661, in voting to settle what was after- 
ward Wrentham, grants six hundred acres to the settlers, 
and afterward gives up all claim toNihem, foj^AvJs^Jfch t'hey . 
are to pay XI 60, in instalments.^ Roxbury, in settling Wooa- ^ 
stock, voted that if thirty men should go- they should have 
one-half of it, in one square, at their selection, and ^£500 to 
assist them, to be laid out in public buildin^\ The other 
inhabitants were to have the rest.^ 

It was important that when a tract of land was granted, 
either to an individual or for a new plantation, it should be 
speedily occupied, as the making of still other grants might 
depend upon it. But it would seem that some neglected to , 
improve their grants, for in 1634 it was ordered that if any 
large grant was not improved within three years, the court 
might dispose of it.* In the case of plantations, it was gen- 
erally made a condition that a certain number of families 
(commonly twenty) should be settled within a given time 
(usually from one to three years), so that a ministry might be 
supported. Sometimes, also, it was stipulated that settle- 
ment should begin within a certain time.'' 

It was necessary that unfriendly settlers should be ex- 
cluded from the new plantations, and also that existing set- 
tlements should not be unnecessarily weakened. So it was 
ordered, in 1635, that none should go to the new plantation 

' Letter of Rev. Mr. Lothrop, in Freeman, Cape Cod, II. 375. 
" Annals of Dedham. 
2 Ellis's Roxbury, loc. cit. 

^ Mass. Rec, I. 114. Mr. Dudley, however, had a grant of 1,000 acres, 
** without limit to time of improvement." Ihid. 206. 
^ Mass. Rec, Conn. Rec. 



579] The Land System of the New England Colonies. 35 

at Marblehead without leave of court or of two magistrates ; ^ 
and the following year the same powers were conferred upon 
the majority of the magistrates with reference to all new 
plantations.^ 

But the Government went further, and aided the settle- 
ment of new plantations more actively, and, when important 
to the colony, by extraordinary acts and measures. So, when 
settlement was authorized at Newbury, an advance post, it 
was resolved that the court should have power to see that it 
received a sufficient number to make a town.^ 

Again, when Concord was settled, the magistrates were 
authorized to impress carts, etc., for those who had goods to 
be carried thither ;^ and at Hampton men were so impressed 
to build a house forthwith.^ 

The new plantations were exempted from the payment of 
public charges for a variable number of years up to six or 
even more, in the more remote and hazardous situations.^ 

The interests of individuals were often made subordinate 
to those of plantations, as those were to the colonies.'' A 
house built without leave from the town, if prejudicial, might 
be demolished and the persons removed.^ Private lands might 
be taken for the purposes of the settlement, but the rights 
of grantees were protected, and provision was made for com- 
pensation in case of damage.^ 

'Mass. Kec.,I. 147. 

' Ibid. I. 167. A settlement at Hampton was first authorized. 

^Ibid. 146; 

^Ibid. 157, 183. 

5 Ibid. 167. 

^ Ibid, passim. Saco River Settlement, IV. 434. 

Ubid.l. 147; 11.48. 

^ Ibid. 1.1Q8. 

9 /6*(Z. I. 68, 147. 



36 The Land System of the Neic England Colonies. [580 

VII. 
LAND COMMUNITIES. 

Commoners and Non-Commoners. 

The last stage in the process of distribution is that in 
Avhich lands pass from the community to its individual mem- 
bers^ involving the dissolution of the community itself, or 
its transformation into a political community. 

"In Swiss villages/^ says Laveleye, "the Beisassen, or 
simple residents, frequently have no share in the 'Allmends.' 
The Beisassen have often complained of this distinction, 
which has given rise to violent struggles between the reform- 
ers, who demand equal rights for all, and the conservatives, 
who endeavor to maintain the old exclusion. * * * Gen- 
erally, arrangements have been adopted securing certain rights 
to the mere residents.'^ ^ We have here, in a few words, the 
history of the land communities of our own colonial period, 
wherever the inevitable collision of hostile interests has not 
been prevented by some happy combination of circumstances. 

The distinction between " commoners " and " non-com- 
moners ^^ was very early made, and these names themselves 
were in general use. But the term " proprietor '^ was also 
employed with the same meaning as " commoner,^^ and soon 
came to be considered the proper legal term ; and we find 
now in our towns the records of the owners of common 
lands always under the name of "proprietors' records." 
The " commoners " were originally those to whom the General 
Court had made a grant of land in common for settlement, 
very often, as we have seen, without giving the grantees en- 
tire, unfettered control. They formed, as has been held, a 
^itos^i-corporation, having the powers of other corporations 
for certain specified purposes.^ The right of a commoner 

' La Propriete Primitive, 23. 
23 Verm. Rep. 553. Mass. Rep. 



581] The Land System of the New England Colonics. 37 

might be conveved or inherited like other real estate, and one 
who thus became entitled to a right was not necessarily an 
inhabitant, nor was he necessarily entitled to vote in the 
town-meetings, when township privileges had been conferred 
upon the inhabitants of a plantation. On the other hand, 
it by no means followed that because a man was entitled to 
a vote in the town, he was also entitled to a voice in the 
control of the common lands, or that he had any right to 
them whatever. The land community and the political com- 
munity were distinct bodies, capable of dealing with other 
persons and bodies, and with each other as separate juristic 
persons.^ 

Thus we find votes of the town according rights to the 
^^ proprietors,'' or even making engagements with them. 

The proprietors, too, might make grants to the town as to 
any other parties, as in the case of Ipswich (Mass.), where 
they granted the ^^ cow commons," north of the river, com- 
prising 3,244 acres, to the inhabitants of the town (which 
probably included all the commoners), to be improved.^ The 
same proprietors, in 1788, granted to the town their whole 
interest in the commons, to help pay debts incurred in the 
Revolution.'^ 

But, although the distinction between the two bodies is well 
marked and generally observed, in practice they were some- 
times blended, and the strictness with which they were at any 
time kept apart depends upon a variety of circumstances. 

In plantations where the inhabitants were all commoners, 
or where there were few who were not such, the distinction 
was commonly disregarded at first. The two bodies were 

^ This is the case in many Teutonic village-communities, the result of a 
long course of changes in the original system. See v. Maurer, Gesch. d. 
Dorfverf. II. 247, etc. Especially in Switzerland, ihid. p. 253. Comp. 
Laveleye, loc. cit. 

2 Felt, Hist, of Ipswich, etc., 14. 

^Ibid. 161. The tract called the Town Common was granted to the 
town of Cambridge (Mass.) by the proprietors, to lie undivided, etc., for- 
ever. Proprietors' Records in Holmes's Hist, of Cambridge, 35. 



38 The Land System of the New England Colonies, [582 

vsubstantially identical, and acted as* one. At the meetings 
of the freemen, matters relating both to the land rights of the 
community and to the local government of the plantations 
were settled, and the same records served for the town and 
for the proprietors. So, for instance, in Groton, settled in 
1655, there were no separate meetings of the proprietors prior 
to 1713.^ But as the number of non-commoners became con- 
siderable, the original settlers multiplying, and newcomers 
streaming in, the commoners found it necessary to look after 
their rights. In the town of Hampton (JST. H.), where three 
years after the settlement (1641) persons who were not free- 
men were, present at the town meetings, as appears by the 
records, it was voted in 1662 that " no man be considered iln 
inhabitant, or act in town aifairs, * ^i^ * b^jt he that 
hath one share at least of commonage, according to the first 
division.'^ ^ 

In 1700, it was voted that no one should vote unless a 
freeholder ; and " none to vote to dispose of lands, unless he 
is a commoner,'' etc.^ Thus, by this simple contrivance, the 
necessity of two organizations was for a time avoided. But 
this was not long deemed sufficient, and separate meetings of 
the '' proprietors '' and of the town became the rule, and 
were held so long as any common lands remained. Separate 
records of these proprietors' meetings are very generally 
found in the older towns, where they form legal evidence of 
title. 

In some of the towns, the need of protecting the rights of 
commoners was strongly felt almost from the beginning. 
This was especially the case in the oldest plantations, which 
were most directly affected by the stream of immigration 
from England. In Watertown (Mass.), even in 1635, it was 
voted, ^^ In consideration there be too many inhabitants in 
the town, and the town thereby in danger to be ruinated, 

^ Butler, Hist, of Groton. 

^ Records of the town of Hampton. 



583] The Land System of the New England Colonies. 39 

that no forrainers coming into the town, or any family arising 
among ourselves, shall have any benefit, either of commonage 
or of land undivided, but what they shall purchase, except 
they buy a man's right wholly in the town." ^ In 1660, it 
was said in Ipswich that 'Hhe common lands are over- 
burdened by dwelling-houses. No house henceforth erected 
is to have any right to commonage, or to the common lands, 
without express leave." And this order was confirmed by 
the General Court.^ 

The distinctive rights of the proprietors were in general 
fully acknowledged by the town. At Haverhill, in 1702, the 
town refused to act on a petition, " because not directed to 
the proprietors of lands, but to the town, many of whom 
have no power to vote in the disposal of lands." ^ 

At Wenham, when the power of the commoners to divide 
lands was questioned, the town confirmed it, and granted the 
lands to those who had drawn them."^ But the rights of the 
respective parties were not always so clearly understood, and 
it is certain that some had honest doubts upon the subject, 
and in some cases opinions prevailed which were actually 
wrong. It may ^ be conjectured that the readiness of the 
towns to recognize the rights of the commoners depended 
very much upon the relative strength of the commoners in 
the town meetings. Where the majority of the voters were 
commoners, although there might be discontent, and although 
that discontent might be loudly expressed, there would be no 

attempts to seize the power to control or dispose of the com- 

^ « 

1 Bond, Hist, of Watertown, 995. 

2 Pelt, Hist, of Ipswich, 16. Mass. Rec. 

3 Ciiase, Hist, of Haverhill, 205. 

4 Allen, Hist, of Wenham, 50. 

^ The Selectmen of Roxbury were directed, in 1692, to consult authority 
and obtain their judgment concerning the right proprietors of common 
lands. " Some claimed that they belonged to the first proprietors, and not 
to the body at large." Ellis, Hist, of Roxbury, 72-3. And in Barn- 
stable there were hot debates upon the same questions. Freeman, Cape 
Cod, II. 202-3. 



40 The Land System of the New England Colonies, [584 

mon lands. But there is abundant evidence that where the 
numbers of the non-commoners were sufficient, either alone 
or in combination with a fraction of the commoners, there 
was no lack of a disposition to get control, and to exercise 
that control for their own advantage; and this was done 
sometimes with little regard to legal rights. 

In the same town of Haverhill, to which I have referred 
as an instance of clear recognition of the proper ownership 
of common land, there were long-continued troubles about 
that very point, and the non-commoners, after making to the 
commoners a proposition to share with them, which was 
refused, tried to exercise control, and to grant lands. As 
the commoners proceeded to make divisions of the commons, 
and continued to do so, the feeling became very bitter. In 
1723, committees were chosen by both parties to make some 
agreement, and some small grants were made to the non- 
commoners to quiet them. But the troubles revived and the 
strife grew worse. Two sets of town officers were chosen, and 
the General Court had to decide between them. But the 
proprietors prevailed, and at length the opposition was given 
up.^ 

But in other cases the proprietors did not fare so well. In 
Simsbury (Conn.), in 1719, the town, after reserving com- 
monage, voted to sequester the rest to the town, and to grant 
it as the majority — not in numbers, but in ratable estate- 
should determine. This gave great offense, but the town 
made many grants. In 1723, a town-meeting was held which 
lasted for three successive days and nearly one whole night, 
and grants were made to the greater part of the inhabitants. 

The proprietors appealed to the Legislature, but got no 
relief until the general law was passed some years later. 
After that they managed exclusively what lands were left, 
but it does not appear that they ever received any redress 
for the injuries' inflicted by the action of the town. 

^ Chase, Hist, of Haverhill. 



585] The Land System of the New England Colonics. 41 

In the nature of things, there must have been contentions 
about these questions very generally in the towns of New 
England, although under some circumstances they w^ere long 
postponed.^ In the towns of the Connecticut Valley the sub- 
ject of dividing the commons was not much agitated until the 
latter part of the 17th century. But the agitation continued 
with intervals for half a century or more. Jonathan Edwards, 
in a letter written in 1751, said there had been in Northamp- 
ton for forty or fifty years " two parties, somewhat like the 
court and country parties of England, if I may compare 
small things with great. The first party embraced the great 
proprietors of land, and the parties concerned about land and 
other matters."^ 

In some cases the differences between the two parties were 
settled by committees from their own number,^ or by referees 
from other towns.'' 

But extreme measures and even the necessity of arbitration 
were commonly avoided by the good sense of both parties, 
and by the public spirit frequently shown by the proprietors. 
The reason for making grants of more territory than was 
needed for the immediate wants of the first settlers has 
already been stated,^ and it was, in most cases, well under- 
stood. The legal title was in the original planters, but there 
was in most cases a moral trust in favor of later comers, and, 
although sometimes only under pressure, the obligation was 
very generally recognized — at least so long as the commons 
exceeded the requirements of the commoners. There were 
two ways of satisfying the claims of non-commoners. The 
first was by increasing the number of commoners, and this was 
not infrequently done. The old records give evidence of the 
custom, mentioning, wdthout comment, the admission of com- 

1 Phelps, Hist, of Simsbury, 80 ei seq. 

2 Judd, Hist, of Hadley, etc., 381. Comp. Maine, Early Hist, of Inst. 84. 
^ See p. 40, ante. 

^ As at Barnstable. See Freeman, Hist, of Cape Cod, II. 203. 
^Ante, 33. 



42 The Land System of the New England Colonies, [586 

moners.^ And in some cases the number of commoners varied 
according to a fixed system. 

But more usual was the granting of certain lands to new- 
comers without any accompanying rights to commonage. 
This was done either for individuals by name, or to all of a 
given class. At Barnstable four acres were voted to every 
widow. ^ Oftener still the newcomers were included with 
the commoners in a general division of lands to all the in- 
habitants, by which, however, no right to share in further 
divisions was conveyed. Thus at Eastham, in 1652, a division 
of common lands was made " to first settlers and newcomers.'^ ^ 
So, too, at Ipswich, as we have seen, a large tract was granted 
to the inhabitants, with the commoners, to be improved.^ In 
the towns of the Connecticut Valley, and some towns of the 
New Haven Colony, it seems to have been usual to make 
such division, the rights of the original settlers being suf- 
ficiently protected by the principle of the allotment, of which 
we shall speak. ^ 

YIII. 
LAND COMMUNITIES — (Continued). 

Division of Common Lands. 

In the allotment of lands in the diiferent towns, several 
things were taken into consideration. For the simplicity 
of the rules adopted by Wenham (Mass.), with but one dis- 
senting voice, ^' that all commoners should stand equally, both 

^ Felt, Hist, of Ipswich, 161 ; 144 new commoners were admitted there. 
Records of Hampton, etc. At Diixbury, in 1710, the young men were 
granted, on petition, half a share. Town Records, ia Winsor, Hist, of 
Dux bury. 

2 Freeman, Cape Cod, II. 379. 

Ubid. 
Felt, Ipswich, 14. 

^ Lambert, Hist, of New Haven, etc. Judd, Hist, of Hadley, etc. 



587] The Land System of the New England Colonies. 43 

as to quantity and quality/' ^ had but few imitators. Num- 
bers were, of course^ an essential element in the computation, 
but estate was of still more consequence and prominence, and 
was very generally made the principal basis of division. 

The valuation of each man's estate was for this purpose 
made from the tax-list, according to the rates paid by him 
toward the public expenses. Thus, at Haverhill, in 1643, it 
was voted that "he that was worth X200, to have 20 acres to 
his house-lot * * * and so every one under that sum to 
have acres proportionable for his house-lot, together with 
meadow and common, and planting ground, proportionably ." '^ 
At Ipswich, 1665, lands were divided among the commoners 
according to rates.^ So, too, at Dedham,^ where a somewhat 
complicated rule prevailed ; in Hartford and the other Con- 
necticut River towns ; ^ in the settlements along the Sound,'' 
and in many other places. 

Where the town itself did not prescribe the mode of 
division, the committee having the division in charge would 
commonly favor those having estate, as we see in the case of 
the Boston committee, about whose election there was so 
much trouble in 1634. Winthrop says : " The inhabitants 
of Boston met to choose seven men who should divide the 
town lands among them. In their choice they left out Mr. 
Winthrop, Coddington and other of the chief men ; only they 
chose one of the elders and a deacon, and the rest of the 
inferior sort, and Mr. Winthrop had the greater number 
before one' of them by a voice or two. This they did as fear- 
ing that the richer men would give the poorer sort no great 
proportions of land, but would rather leave a great part at 
liberty for new comers and for commons, which Mr. Win- 

J Allen, Hist, of Wenham, 2. 

2 Records of Haverhill, in Chase, Hist, of H. 56. 

3 Felt, Hist, of Ipswich, 16. 

^Annals of Dedham, 83. 

5 Judd, Hist, of Hadley, etc. 

* Lambert, Hist, of New Haven, etc. 



44 The Land System of the New England Colonies. [588 

throp had oft persuaded them to as best for the town.'^ The 
elders were offended and Winthrop declined. But a new 
election was held, after a talk by Mr. Cotton, and Winthrop 
and other leading men were appointed to dispose of the lands 
as they should see fit. Winthrop says of their course that it 
"was partly to prevent the neglect of trades * * * and 
partly that there might be place to receive such as should 
come after ; seeing it would be very prejudicial to the com- 
monwealth if men should be forced to go far off for land, 
while others had much, and could make no use of it more 
than to please their eye with.'' ^ This account well illustrates 
both the spirit of the leaders, and the opposition sometimes 
found. But we have seen that at an early day it became the 
practice of the General Court to name committees to super- 
intend the organization of new plantations, and one of their 
most important functions was the division of lands among 
the first settlers. In a few cases the Government fixed a 
maximum which no gi*ant could exceed until a certain number 
had joined the community.^ But the whole subject was gen- 
erally left to the discretion of the committee. In this way 
conformity to the policy of the Government was insured. 

The opposition to such a plan of division which might have 
been expected was prevented in great measure, partly by 
the evident reasonableness of the general principle that land 
should be given to those who could use it, and partly by the 
provisions made to guard against excessive inequality in the 
shares allotted to different persons. 

At Springfield (Mass.) it was the original agreement 
(1636) that every inhabitant should have a convenient pro- 
portion of land for a house-lot, " as we shall see meete for 
every one's quality and estate." Then, further, "we shall 
observe this rule about dividing of planting ground and 
meadow, in all planting ground to regard chiefly persons 
who are most apt to use such ground. And in all meadow 

1 Winthrop, N. B., I. 152. 

2 Mass. Rec, IV. Part II. 500 ; V. 33. 



589] The Land System of the New England Colonies. 45 

and pasture, to regard chiefly cattle and estate, because estate 
is like to be improved in cattle, and such ground is aptest for 
their use. And yet loe agree, that no person that is master of 
a lot, though he have not cattle, shall have less than 3 acres 
of planting ground, &c.'' ^ In Northampton, allotments were 
to be to families, according to " names, estates and qualifica- 
tions," but every single man was to have 4 acres of meadow, 
besides the rest of his division, and every head of a family 
6 acres .^ In the division of Hadley lands, each proprietor 
received allotments according to a sum annexed to his name, 
called estate, varying from £60 to £200, and probably the 
result of amicable agreement. At another time, an estate of 
XI 50 was credited to each proprietor, perhaps in addition to 
his "rate." In this town, although lands were divided 
according to each one's real estate as it stood in the tax-list, 
we find that the head of a family ivithout real estate drew on 
different occasions 50, 50 and 11 acres, respectively. In one, 
a £50 allotment was given to every householder, and £26 
for each male minor above 16. 

Although in this way " the wealthy man had as much on 
account of his slave as the poor man on his own account," 
the poor man was well provided for, and we are told that, 
apart from the grants just mentioned, among the original 
proprietors of Hadley, the largest share was only four times 
greater than the smallest, and later five times greater; and 
that " the equity of divisions was never called in question." ^ 
In a division made at Ipswich in 1665, lands were divided 
according to rates in the proportion of 4, 6 and 8, thus giving 
the poorest one-half as much as the richest.'^ The same pro- 

* Records of Springfield, in Holland, Western Mass. I. 25. 

Ubid. I. 47. 

Barnstable, by general consent, divided one-third to every house-lot 
equally; one-third to the number of names that are immovable — ^. e., to 
such as are married or 25 years of age — and the other one-third according 
to men's estates. Freeman, Cape Cod, II. 256. 

^Holland, I. 33. 

4 Felt, Hist, of Ipswich, 161. 



46 The Land System of the New England Colonies, [590 

portion was observed in some other towns, although sometimes 
the inequality was much greater, and the rates varied in dif- 
ferent divisions even in the same town. ^ The later divisions 
of woodland in the river towns were far more unequal than 
the earlier distributions of intervale.^ 

Dedham (Mass.) had some additional special rules for 
allotment, and among them that servants should be referred 
to men's estates, and according to men's estates; that allot- 
ments should be "according to men's rank, quality, desert 
and usefulness, either in church or commonwealth. That 
men of useful trades may have material to improve the same, 
be encouraged and have land, as near home as may be con- 
venient, and that husbandmen that have abilities to improve 
more than others, be considered." ^ 

In this town (Dedham) a portion of land was always 
reserved for town, church and school, and reservations of 
land for school, church and ministry were usual in the 
towns, even if not required by the conditions of their grant.^ 

In making a grant for a plantation near Lake Quinsiga- 
mond, the court inserted the condition that in the allotment 
of lands, 200 or 300 acres, with meadow, should be reserved 
for the commonwealth.^ The precedent was followed in 1670 
in the grant for a plantation south of Springfield and West- 
field,^ in those for Squakeage ^ and Lancaster,' Dunstable,^ etc., 
and soon became the general practice. 

In the first case cited, power was given to the committee of 
the court to settle tenants for lives, or for terms, paying a 
small rent. But nothing is usually said of such a plan in 
making the later reservations.^ 

' Judd, Hadley, etc., 30, 31. ^Annals of Dedham, 83. 

3 Annals of Dedham ; and see Freeman, Cape Cod, II. 202 (Barnstable) ; 
379 (Eastham); 245 (Sandwich); and Lambert, New Haven, etc., 96, etc. 

*Mass. Rec, IV. Part II. 409. 

5 i&iVZ. IV. Part II. 469. Ubid. 529, ' Ibid. 545 [1 sq. m, 

reserved). ^ Ibid. 571. 

^ Leases of public or common lands, by colony or town, were not very 
common. But Duxbury seems to have leased extensively, especially 
meadows. Town Records, in Winsor, Hist, of Duxbury. 



^^ 



591] The Land System of the New England Colonies. 47 

The case of the plantations along the Sound differed some- 
what from that of other towns in New England. These did 
not occupy territory granted by any colonial or other govern- 
ment. The lands had been bought outright by the principal 
men, and were held in trust for the people, who, after con- 
tributing to pay expenses, drew lots in proportion to their 
contribution.^ 

In the New Haven Colony, it was ordered "that every 
planter give in the names of the heads of the persons in his 
family (wherein his wife, together with himself and children, 
only are to be reckoned), wdth an estimate of his estate, 
according to which he will both pay his proportion in all 
rates and public charges, * * * and expect lands in all 
divisions, which shall be generally made to the planters.^' ^ 
In the first division the rate was 5 acres to .£100, and 2 J 
acres for each person.^ 

In Guilford, it was agreed that " every one should pay his 
proportional part or share toward all the charges and expenses 
for purchasing, settling, surveying and carrying on the neces- 
sary public affairs of the plantations, and that all divisions of 
the land should be made in exact proportion to the sums they 
advanced and expended." Divisions were made accordingly. 
But even here no one could put in more than X500 without 
permission of the freemen.^ 

Milford, however, " sequestered " a belt of land around the 
town two miles wide, and divided lands from time to time 
among the inhabitants according to their estate in lists of 
different years. The number of proprietors was, therefore, 
variable, rising, e. g., between 1686 and 1712 from 109 to 197. 
But a division of 1805 was based upon the list of 1686, the 
earlier number having been thus fixed upon.^ 

Divisions and grants of common lands could generally be 

> Dwight, Hist, of Conn. 84. 

2 New Haven Col. Rec. 192. 

-'Ibid. 

^Lambert, New Haveu, etc., 163. 

5 Ibid. 96. 



48 The Land System of the New England Colonies. [592 

made by a majority vote, and the power was often delegated 
to selectmen or committees. But Milford required the con- 
sent of three-fourths of the inhabitants/ and in Eastham 
(Mass.) the action of the majority was restricted by pro- 
vision that the grant, to be valid, should " be subjected to 
the negative of men chosen for that purpose, and shall be laid 
out and bounded on their approval." ^ 

In addition to the division of lands among the proprietors 
or the inhabitants, the towns, like the colonial governments, 
sometimes made grants to individuals, especially to those 
whose services were or might be valuable. Thus Groton 
made grants to encourage the establishment of a mill ; ^ Haver- 
hill did the same,'^ as did many other towns. Lands vv^ere also 
sold occasionally for various purposes, as at Barnstable in 
1691 (to raise money for the expenses of obtaining the Colony 
Charter),^ but this was never done to any great extent. 



IX. 
LAND COMMUNITIES.— (Continued). 

Resteictions upon Alienation. 

A very interesting feature in the early history of the insti- 
tutions of New England is the care taken to preserve the 
original character of the community, and to control its mem- 
bership. As the entire right of commoners might be assigned, 
and usually passed with a grant of land by a commoner, it 
was not enough for the town to retain the right of admitting 
freemen ; it also needed to have control over sales of land 
made by its members, especially of house lots. This control 
has been very generally claimed and exercised by land com- 

^ Lambert, New Haven, etc., 96. 

2 Freeman, Cape Cod, II. 376. 

3 Butler, Hist, of Groton, 33. 

4 Chase, Haverhill, 84. 

5 Freeman, Cape Cod, II. 379. 



593] The Land System of the New England Colonies. 49 

munities, wherever found, and for similar reasons ; and the 
resemblance in this respect between the institutions of com- 
munities so widely separated in time and place is very 
marked and worthy of notice. 

In the village communities of Russia, a man may not sell 
his house and land to one who is a stranger to the " mir " 
without the consent of the inhabitants of the village, who have 
always the right of pre-emption.^ Similar rules prevailed in 
Germany,^ France ^ and Ireland ; ^ and the right of the inhabit- 
ants of a village to reclaim land in case of sale to a stranger 
is, according to Laveleye, found everywhere.^ 

The land communities of New England formed no excep- 
tion to this, but the rules which were adopted in them to 
effect the purpose, although similar in substance, were of 
varying degrees of strictness. 

In Connecticut, a law of 1659 declares that ^' No inhabit- 
ant shall have power to make sale of his accommodation of 
house and lands until he have first propounded the sale thereof 
to the town where it is situate, and they refuse to accept of the 
sale tendered.'' ^ Elsewhere the subject was left to the towns. 
The General Court of Massachusetts did, indeed, once raise 
the question whether towns could restrain individuals from 
sale of their lands or houses ; but no action is recorded, and 
the proceedings of the towns were not interfered with.*^ At 
Guilford (Conn.), no one could sell or alien his share, or any 
part of it, or purchase of another, unless by consent of the com- 
munity.^ Watertown (Mass.), in 1638, made a provision 

' Laveleye, La Propriete Primitive, 11. 

■^Maurer, '* Das weit verbreitete Vorkaufsrecht der Dorfmarkgenossen," 
u. s. w. ; see Dorfverf. I. 320. 

^ See the Coutume de Bayonne, cited by Maurer in the same, 323. " Le 
A^oisin et habitant de la dite ville est prefere a I'etranger acheteur." 

* Ancient Laws of Ireland, cited in Maine, Early Hist, of Institutions, 
109. 

^LaPropr. Prim. 152. 

«Conn. Rec. 1. 351. 

■' Mass. Rec. I. 201. 

^Lambert, New Haven, etc., 163. 



60 The Land System of the New England Colonies. [594 

"against selling town lots to forrainers," ^ and Wenliam, 
1642, voted that " in case any wished to remove from the 
village, they were to offer their places for sale first to the 
plantation.^^ ^ Barnstable ordered the same, and further, 
" in case the plantation buy it not, then he shall provide a 
purchaser whom the town shall approve, and if the town do 
not provide a chapman in two months, he may then sell it 
to whom he will/' ^ Billerica allowed the proprietor of a " 10 
acre privilege '^ to sell a " 5 acre privilege,^' and one who had 
not more than a " 10 acre privilege '' could not dispose of it, 
even to his children, unless the town had refused to make 
them a grant.^ Meadfield imposed the restriction for seven 
years only.^ The need of such legislation after some years 
was not felt as at first, and the restrictions eventually were 
everywhere disregarded. 

Common Fields. 

The proportion of land cultivated in common varied greatly 
at different periods and in different places. At first, com- 
mon cultivation was on a much larger scale than it was at a 
later day. For, the practice being adopted as a matter of 
necessity in most cases,^ whenever the necessity ceased to be 
felt, the practice was no longer favored. They sometimes 
included nearly all the " improved '' lands of the town, as at 
Simsbury (Conn.), where a committee of the General Court 
laid out two fields extending seven miles on each side of the 
river.' In other cases, although they did not include all the 
lands, they yet included some lands in which all the people 
of the town were interested. It was to such fields that the 



^Town Records, in Bond, Hist, of Watertown, 995. 
^ Allen, Hist, of Wenham, 26. 
3 Freeman, Cape Cod, II. 254. 
^Farmer, Hi§t. Memoir, 8. 
^Annals of Dedham, 99. 

*" Necessity constraining the improvement of much land in common." 
Conn. Col. Rec. I. 101. 
' See Phelps, Simsbury, 80. 



595] The Land System of the New England Colonies. 51 

laws of Connecticut and Massachusetts referred, giving 
authority over them to the townsmen or selectmen of the town, 
or, where there were none, to the major part of the freemen,^ to 
order the manner of their improvement. Massachusetts 
afterward put the power over common meadows and pastures 
in the hands of the proprietors of the greatest part,^ as she 
had done at first in case of cornfields.^ It is probable, how- 
ever, that this law refers to groups of owners smaller in 
number than the whole body of commoners. Common fields 
of this sort were found in most of the towns. Sometimes 
they were formed from lack of the means to fence separately ; 
sometimes from the difficulty of fencing, as on the extensive 
intervale-lands of the Connecticut, and often from mere con- 
siderations of convenience. In Milford (Conn.), the town 
lots were at first fenced in common, and soon after three 
large common fields were formed. Much of the land in that 
town was thus cultivated, and " field meetings " were held to 
manage the common property.'^ 

Lands were even granted to be thrown together into a 
common field. ^ They were sometimes meadow, sometimes 
pasture, and sometimes plowing land.^ 

Fences were maintained by each owner according to his 
share in the land enclosed. Sometimes gates or bridges were 
thus maintained instead of a portion of fence, and in Milford 
and Stratford lands were held upon condition of such service,^ 
the proper care of them being of importance to the whole 
town. 

The bounds of lands lying in common were to be perambu- 

' Mass. Rec. II. 49 ; Conn. Rec. I. 101, 214. 
•^Ibid. 11.195. 

3 Ibid. 39. 

4 Lambert, New Haven, etc., 96-97 (from Town Records, Lib. I. 87). 
See also Town Records of Stratford, Lib. I. 

^Bond, Watertown, 995. 
« Mass. Rec. II. 49. 

■'Milford Town Records (in Lambert, New Haven, etc., 96). Stratford 
Town Records, 



52 The Land System of the New England Colonies. [596 

lated by the particular proprietors, and boundary marks (mere 
stones) to be carefully kept up.^ 

A resemblance will be noticed between these smaller groups 
of cultivators in common and the alp and vineyard communi- 
ties in Europe.^ 

Home Lots, Acre Eights, Pitches. 

Home Lots or Souse Lots. — The exact meaning of these 
terms in the earliest years of the colonies it is not easy to fix. 
They differed in size in different towns, and often in the same 
town. But sometimes they are all of the same or nearly the 
same size, and the difference only one of situation. At Barn- 
stable they are said to have been from 6 to 12 acres^ at 
Haverhill 5 to 22 acres, at Groton 10 to 20 acres, etc., etc. 
When they were of variable size in the same town, they were 
often proportioned to the " quality and estate " of the pos- 
sessor, as at Springfield,^ Haverhill,^ and other places. Some- 
times the right to choose a house lot was drawn for " according 
to estate,^' as at Hadley.^ 

Whatever their size or the mode of allotment, the house 
lots were an important part of the New England system. 
They were laid out so as to form a village as the centre of a 
plantation, and thus ensure the security of one compact set- 
tlement and the various advantages of village life. A certain 
dignity attached to the original lots, and it was considered 
important to the community that they should not be aban- 
doned or neglected, or even thrown together. 

In Connecticut, to remedy and prevent so " great an abuse,'^ 
it was ordered that " all dwelling or mansion houses that are 
or shall be allowed in any plantation or town in this juris- 
diction shall be upheld, repaired and maintained sufficient '^ ; 

' Conn. Rec. I. 513. 
^Maurer, Gesch. d. Dorfverf. I. 27. 
3 Holland, Rec. of Springfield in West Mass. I. 35. 
•* Chase, Haverhill, 56. " He that was worth £200 to have 20 acres to 
his lot." 
6Judd, Hadley, etc., 287. 



597] The Land System of the New England Colonies. 53 

also, that owners of lots not built upon are to build within 
twelve months after date.^ 

Acre Bights or Lots. — This is an expression of entirely dif- 
ferent nature, and merely indicates the share owned by any 
one in the common lands. Their value varied greatly in the 
different towns, but was, of course, a fixed quantity in each 
town. In Billerica, for instance, a 10-acre lot or right was 
equivalent to 113 acres of upland and 12 acres of meadow, aiid 
so on in exact proportion.^ In Groton there were 60-acr 
20-acre, etc., rights, and there were 755 rights in all. A 
acre right would have entitled the owner on complete parn - 
tion to 3,242 acres of common lands. ^ 

Pitches. — These were rights drawn in a division which en- 
titled the drawer to lay out a lot of land in the commons 
wherever he might choose. The practice was common in the 
later history of the colonies, although not always judicially 
approved. 

From the examination of our subject which has been made 
thus far, it appears that the exemption from feudal burdens in 
which we rejoice is not due to any merit of the colonists, for 
the free-socage tenure flows from the language of the grant, 
which, as we have seen, was not exceptional, even in England, 
at that day. The founders of the American colonies were 
not, in this respect, in advance of public sentiment in the 
mother country, as may be seen by reference to the journals 
of Parliament under James I. 

But, apart from this, in every other respect the excellence 
of our land system is certainly due to the wisdom and patriot- 
ism of the leaders of the infant commonwealths — men who 
held their leadership by virtue of education, character and 
independent position. 

The essential feature of the plan adopted in the settlement 
of the soil was that it was accomplished by organized col- 

' Conn. Eec. I. 563. 

2 Parmer, Hist. Mem. 8. 

3 Butler, Groton, 29. 



54 The Land System of the New England Colonies. [598 

onization, and that the unit of colonization was a small 
plantation, which, whether from tradition or inherited, in- 
stinctive prepossession — a survival, if you will — closely 
resembled the ancient village communities of the Old World. 

The organization of these communities and the character 
of the members were mainly determined by committees chosen 
with care by the central authority. The persons who were 
to compose it were selected by that authority or its commit- 
tees, so that the principles of the larger commonwealth were 
adopted in the new settlement and carried out in the further 
division of the soil. Great pains were taken to guard against 
excessive grants and the accumulation of large estates ; and 
the perpetual maintenance of this division into small hold- 
ings was secured by the laws of succession, while the registry 
laws adopted at an early date tended to the same result by 
making the alienation of land by deed easy and simple. Free- 
hold tenure was the universal rule. 

In the division of the soil of New England among the 
settlers, our ancestors were guided by no visionary theories 
of equality. Land, however abundant, was to be given to 
those who could use it. Yet no great inequality was coun- 
tenanced, and every one had enough. As a rule, all the land 
granted was soon occupied, except the parts reserved for a 
time as common. In the few instances where land was 
allowed by non-resident holders to lie unimproved, legisla- 
tion was promptly brought to bear providing for its equitable 
taxation, and the threatened evil was thus prevented.^ Many 
grants were also by their terms made forfeitable if not im- 
proved within a given time. Provision was made for the 
maintenance of the ministry in all grants to communities, 
and the plantations generally reserved lands for school pur- 
poses.^ 

1 Mass. Rec. V. 375. A. & R. of Mass. Bay, II. 616, 941 ; III. 251. 

2 111 New Hampshire the grants of the royal Governors reserved certain 
shares for public or pious uses. 10 Verm. Rep. 9. Maiden was granted 
1,000 acres for the use of the ministry forever ; but this was exceptional. 
Mass. Rec, IV. Pt. II. 45. 



599] The Land System of the New England Colonies, 55 

Of scarcely less importance were the orders by which the 
planters were directed or encouraged to settle closely together, 
*' for safety. Christian communion, schools, civility and other 
good ends.'' ^ The fruits of this policy are seen in the vil- 
lages which form to-day so attractive and characteristic a 
feature of New England life. 

In later days, as the settled portion of the colonies grew 
in extent, the forming of new plantations was sometimes left 
to the enterprise of leading men, and the order of the court 
then took a slightly different form from that which has been 
given .^ But even then the purpose, conditions and exemp- 
tions of the grant are still carefully expressed in the usual 
terms. In New Hampshire, under the royal Governors, less 
care was exercised, and grants often remained unimproved for 
long periods. In Connecticut the action of the planters was 
less under the direction of the colonial authorities. Yet the 
general character of New England plantations was every- 
where and at all periods substantially such as has been 
described in these pages. 

Having seen how the public lands were settled and dis- 
tributed among the colonists, it remains to mention briefly 
some of the rules of law which governed the ownership and 
transfer of land in the hands of private persons, and to 
show their adaptation to the general policy of the colonies, 
which has been here set forth. 

The private law of real property in New England was, in 
the main, that of the mother country, so far as that applied 
to free-socage holdings. But two principles were adopted at 
an early day which, in the words of Chalmers, ^^not only 
mark the spirit of the people, but were, probably, the cause 
of most lasting consequences.'' ^ 

The laws for the distribution of intestate estates in the 
colonies gave the same equal payment to all creditors, and 

' Mass. Rec. V. 214. 

2^. g. Mr. Thomson's grant. Mass. Rec. V. 408. 
^ MS. in possession of Mass. Hist. Soc. (cited Acts and Res. of Mass. 
Bay, I. 107). 



56 The Land System of the New England Colonies. [600 

(except in Rhode Island) the same equal shares to all the 
children, save that the eldest son received a double share. 
This modified preference was, not quite ingenuously, de- 
scribed by some of the colonies' agents as "like that of 
England '^ ; but the right of primogeniture in that country 
was a very different thing, and the colonial rule was probably 
of Mosaic origin. Just as the law in England had — and has 
to this day — its effect upon the voluntary distribution of 
property by will in the custom of making " eldest sons,'' so 
the more natural provisions of colonial law encouraged the 
equal division of property in this country among all the 
children of a testator. 

Laws subjecting the lands of a debtor to levy and execu- 
tion, and those making the heir or executor in effect a trustee 
for creditors, had much to do with the prosperity of the 
colonies.^ To them, says Chalmers, " much of the populous- 
ness and the commerce of Massachusetts is owing." 

The transfer of land, as has been said above, was greatly 
facilitated by laws passed at an early day providing for the 
registration of titles and the simplification of conveyances, 
and the law thus established was substantially that which 
prevails at the present time. 

All these rules of law, it will be seen, harmonized with 
the general spirit of colonial legislation, and favored the 
perpetuation of that order of things which the founders of 
New England sought by their system of settlement to produce. 

For their wisdom and foresight in all these regulations 
respecting the disposition of public lands, and in the private 
law of real property, a great debt is due to them; and the 
more closely the causes of the prosperous social and econom- 
ical condition of New England are studied, the fuller will 
be our appreciation of the benefits which have inured to us 
as the result of the land system whose foundations were laid 
in the early days of colonial history. 

^ MS. in possession of Mass. Hist. Soe. (cited Acts and Res. of Mass. 
Bay, I. 107). 



INDEX TO FOURTH VOLUME 



OF 



Johns Hopkins University Studies 



IN 



HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL SCIENCE. 



A 

Aborigines, right of to land, 551. 
Acre rights in New England, 596,597. 
Adams, Charles F., Vice-President of 

Free-Soil Party, 429. 
Adams.. Herbert B., review of St. 

Clair Papers, 373. 
Adams, John, asked advice as to 

form of government, 197. 
Adams, John Q., eulogy on, in New 

Haven, 481. 
Agrarian laws of the United States 

and Rome, 268. 
Alaska, purchase of, 327, 330 ; dis- 
covery of, 328 ; Sumner on the 

purchase, 332. 
Aldermen, choice of, in New Haven, 

539. 
Aldworth, R., land grant to, 560. 
Andover, town-meeting refuses to 

empower general court to frame 

constitution, 204. 
Andros', Sir Edmund, measures in 

Rhode Island, 91. 
Anne Arundel County erected, 233 ; 

government perfected, 234. 
Annapolis, beginning of, 230, 253. 
Arnold, Wm., antagonism to Roger 

Williams, 83. 
Atherton, Humphrey, land company 

formed by, 117. 
Atwater, Jeremiah, selectman of New 

Haven, 489. 



Austin, David, nomination of to 
town office, 450 ; appointed to 
committee of hospitality, 457 ; on 
the adornment of the Green, 461. 

B 

Baltimore City Council, a story of, 
540. 

Baltimore, Lord, colonial policy of, 
226 ; Puritans' compromise with, 
249 ; feudal conceptions of, 255. 

Bancroft, Geo., on Rhode Island in- 
fluence on the United States, 102 ; 
on Jefferson's anti-slavery pro- 
posal, 343. 

Baptists in Rhode Island, 125. 

Barber, Joseph , issues The Columbian 
Register, 469. 

Barber, Capt., named for Governor- 
ship, 243. 

Barnstable settled from Scituate, 578 ; 
lands for widows in, 586 ; restric- 
tions of alienations, 594 ; house- 
lots, 596. 

Beauchamp, land grant to, 560. 

Beers, Isaac, nomination of for town 
office, 450 ; appointed on committee 
of hospitality, 457. 

Behring, Capt., discovers Alaska, 
328. 

Beisassen, Laveleye on, 580. 

Bennett, Edward, land grant to, 217. 

Bennett, Richard, leaves Virginia, 



68 



Index. 



[602 



223; settles in Maryland, 224; 

charged with instigating rebellion, 

243. 
Bennett, Rev.Wm., Puritan preacher 

in Virginia, 217, 218. 
Benton on Louisiana Purchase, 317 ; 

on the authorship of the Ordinance, 

362. 
Berkeley, Gov., '* Concessions," 142 ; 

unfriendly treatment of the Puri- 
tans, 220, 222. 
Berkshire County, town-autonomy 

theory in, 206. 
Billerica, restrictions on land sale, 

594 ; acre lots in, 597. 
Bishop, Samuel, election of, 450 ; 

municipal letter of, 465. 
Boroughs, Pennsylvania, by Wm. P. 

Holcomb, 131 ; beginnings of, 135 ; 

Thomas Madox on the antiquity 

of, 136 ; Stubbs on, 136 ; in New 

Jersey, 136 ; in Connecticut, 136 ; 

in Virginia, 137; in Maryland, 137 ; 

in Maine, 137 ; Toulmin Smith on, 

162; legislation of this century, 

170; offices, 173; council, 174; 

finance, 175. 
Bounties, military, 389. 
Bradford, Wm., land grant to, 560. 
Bradstreet, Simon, land company of, 

117. 
Braxton's, Carter, address, 197. 
Brenton and Coddington antagonistic, 

83. 
Bristol, borough of, 161 ; town-meet- 
ing, 164. 
Brodhead on the Patroon, 15. 
Brooke, Robt. , land grant of, 231 ; 

offends Gov. Stone, 239. 
Brooklyn, municipal privileges given 

to, 20. 
Buchanan's veto of Homestead Bill, 

432. 
Burnett, David G., President of 

Texas, 321. 



Calhoun's land policy, 409 ; opposes 

pre-emption, 422. 
California, negotiations of purchase, 

326. 
Cambridge, a village grant to, 577. 
Carteret, "Concessions," 142. 



Catlin on New Haven party politics, 
531. 

Chalmers on New England land laws, 
599, 600. 

Champlin, Col., estate of, 119. 

Channing, Edward, on Narragansett 
planters, 105. 

Charles County, Maryland, Puritan 
colony in, 281. 

Charlestown, original extent of, 577. 

Chase's eulogy on the Ordinance of 
1787, 358. 

Chauncey, Charles, appointed to com- 
mittee of hospitality, 457. 

Checkley, editor of Leslie's work. 111. 

City and town government of New 
Haven, 443. (See New Haven.) 

Clarke, John, sent to England to 
secure charter rights, 90. 

Clay, Henry, offers a million dollars 
for the cession of Texas, 319; on 
Alaska Purchase, 328 ; on land 
question, 409, 412 ; distribution 
bill, 415 ; against pre-emption, 
421 ; visits New Haven, 481. 

Claybourne, Wm., settles on Kent 
Island, 224. 

Coddington and Brenton antagonistic, 
83. 

Cole, Josias, refuses to take oath, 251. 

Coles, Gov., ascribes authorship of 
the Ordinance to Jefferson, 367. 

Colfax on Homestead Law, 431. 

Colonies, land tenure in, 273 ; grants 
of land in New England, 561 : 
orders from the company relating 
thereto, 562. 

Columbian Register, The, issued by 
J. Barber, 469. 

Common lands, claims of, 281 ; for 
pasturage and forestry on the Hud- 
son, 38 ; division of in New Eng- 
land, 586, 594. 

Commoners and Non-Commoners, dif- 
ferences and disputes between, 580 ; 
in Groton, Hampton, etc., 582. 

Concord, settlement of, 579. 

Connecticut, boroughs in, 136 ; In- 
dian land deeds in, 552, 553 ; Colo- 
ny incorporated, 557. 

Constitutional and Political History 
of States, by Dr. J. F. Jameson, 
183. 

Copp, Mr., eulogy on Homestead 
Bill, 436. 



603] 



Index. 



59 



Cox,Wm., chosen a Puritan delegate , 
233. 

Cradock, land grant to, 568. 

Crandall, Miss Prudence, teaches ne- 
groes, 473. 

Crawford's system of relief, 408. 

Credit feature of American land sys- 
tem, 402 ; abolition of, 406. 

CrowQ lands, claimants to, 280 ; 
right to land titles, 550. 

Cunningham on the land laws of the 
United States, 276. 

Curtis on the Ordinance of 1787, 357. 

Cutler, Manasseh, authorship of the 
Ordinance ascribed to, 369 ; agent 
of the Ohio Company, 398. 



D 



Daillie, Rev. Pierre, minister in New 
Paltz, 62. 

Dane, Nathan, authorship of the Or- 
dinance, 362, 363, 365. 

Darby, Pa., town-meeting, 166. 

Day, Stephen, land grant of, 569. 

Dedham, land grant, 578 ; common- 
age in, 587 ; allotment, 590. 

Delaware County, town-meeting in, 
166. 

Denison, Daniel, land company, 117. 

Desert Land Acts, 437. 

Domain, Public, origin of, 263; future 
of, 265 ; administration of, 335 ; 
relation to national life, 277 ; for- 
mation of, 279. 

Donaldson on rectangular system, 
392. 

Donation lands, 427. 

Don Morales prohibits the use of New 
Orleans as a depository, 304. 

Don Onis protests against United 
States' occupation of West Florida, 
315 ; opens negotiations relating 
thereto, 316. 

Dorr on Roger Williams, 82. 

Du Bois, Daniel, survivor of the last 
Duzine, 61. 

Durand leaves Virginia, 222 ; settles 
in Maryland, 224 ; compared with 
Roger Wmiams, 257. 

Durfee, Judge, on Rhode Island 
Charter, 9Q. 

Dutch Village Communities on the 
Hudson River, by I. Eiting, 1 ; 



government in, 12 ; education in, 

14. 
Dutchess County, landholding in, 40. 
Duzine, powers of, 55, 60. 
D wight. President, on New England 

prejudice to city market, 456 ; on 

New Haven in 1810, 474. 

E 

Bast India Company, trading enter- 
prises in America, 11, 12 ; coloni- 
zation by, 12. 

Eastham, commonage in, 586 ; land 
division, 592. 

Eaton, land grant to, 569. 

Education in Dutch colonies on the 
Hudson, 14 ; land grants for, 436. 

Edwards, Jonathan, on land and 
landless parties, 585. 

Edwards, Pierpont, appointed on 
committee of hospitality, 457 ; dele- 
gated to Convention, 458. 

Egleston, Melville, on the Land Sys- 
tem of New England Colonies, 545. 

Elbridge, G., land grant to, 560. 

Ellsworth, advocacy of ratification by 
Convention, 199. 

Eiting, Irving, on the Dutch Village 
Communities on the Hudson River, 
1 ; family in New Paltz, 67. 

Eltonhead, Envoy of Gov. Stone, 
243 ; death of, 247. 

Endicott, Agent of Land Company 
in American colonies, 564 ; land 
grant to, 570. 

English Folk-land, 270 : feudal land 
laws, 272. 

Esopus given a charter, 30 ; ground- 
lots in, 37. 

Evans on Land Reform, 428. 

Everett, John, refuses to take arms, 
251. 

Executive of the city of New Haven, 
520, 534. (See New Haven.) 

F 

Fayerweather, library of, 111. 
Federalism in New Haven, 464; fall 

of, 468. 
Fendall, Josias, commissioned Lieut.- 

Governor, 248 ; conspiracy. 252. 
Feudal land laws of England, 272. 
Fire Department in New Haven, 459, 



60 



Index. 



[604 



475, 491 ; insurance proposed, 493. 

Folk-land in England, Germany and 
America, 270. 

Foster, Wm. E., on town govern- 
ment in Rhode Island, 71. 

Floridas, purchase of, 311; revolution 
and independence, 314. 

Force, Peter, on the Ordinance of 
1787, 350. 

Franklin, Pa. , laying out of, 149. 

Free-Soil Democracy, 429. 

Friends' Advent into Rhode Island, 
83, 125 ; into Maryland, 250. 

Fuller, Capt. Wm., advance of upon 
Indians, 238. 

Fustel de Coulanges, on village com- 
munity, 6. 



G 



Gadsden Purchase, 327. 

Gallagher, James, opposes the draft. 
494. 

Gallatin, Albert, on municipal gov- 
ernment, 543. 

Garrison, Wm. Lloyd, on slavery ex- 
citement in New Haven, 473. 

Gates, Sir Thomas, land grant to, 
555. 

General Land Office, 379, 381. 

Georgia cedes her land, 296, 297. 

Germantown, borough of, 151. 

Gilbert, land grants to, 554. 

Godkin, Daniel, conversion of, 220, 
221. 

Gordon on Pennsylvania land sys- 
tem, 140. 

Gorges, Sir Ferdinando, land grant 
to, 556 ; feudalism of, 570. 

Gorham on the appointment of 
judges, 198. 

Gosnold's expedition, effect of, 554. 

Graduation Act, 428. 

Gravesend Charter, 26. 

Gray, Captain, discovers Oregon 
coast, 329. 

Grayson and the Ordinance of 1787, 
347. 

Green on the Puritans, 217. 

Greenberry's Point, settlement on, 
230. 

Greenbriar Company formed, 283. 

Grigsby's Phi Beta Kappa Address 
referred to, 197. 



Gross, Charles, "Mediaeval Bor- 
oughs" referred to, 170. 

Groton, land grant to, 576, 577 ; 
commonage in, 582; home lots, 
596 ; acre lots, 597. 

Grow, Mr., on Homestead Law, 431. 

Guilford, Conn., land division in, 591 ; 
restrictions on alienation, 593. 

Gwin, Senator, proposes the purchase 
of Alaska, 330. 



H 



Hadley, division of land in, 589 ; 
home lots in, 596. 

Hale, John P., elected President of 
Free-Soil Democracy, 429. 

Hamilton, Alexander, on the election 
of the Senate, 198 ; plan for laiid 
office, 379, 399. 

Hampton, jST. H., settlement of, 573, 
579 ; commonage, 582. 

Hard wick town-meeting, 206. 

Harris antagonistic to Roger Wil- 
liams, 83. 

Harrison banished from Virginia, 
222 ; returns to England, 223. 

Hartford, rivalry with New Haven, 
500 ; common lands in, 587. 

Hartranft, Gov., commissions to 
study municipal government, 529. 

Haverhill, commonage in, 583, 584, 
587 ; home lots, 596. 

Hawthorne, Captain, land grant to, 
576. 

Hayne on the authorship of the 
Ordinance of 1787, 362. 

Haynes, land grant to, 568. 

Hazard, Robert, estate of, 119. 

Heffernan, Wm., accused of horse- 
stealing, 113. 

Hegel Township, Pa., population, 172. 

Henry, Patrick, letter referred to, 
167. 

Hillhouse, James, appointed on com- 
mittee of hospitality, 457 ; nomi- 
nated for Convention, 471 ; adorn- 
ment of New Haven Green, 462. 

History, Constitutional and Political, 
of States, by Dr. J. P. Jameson, 
183 ; of the Land Question in the 
United States, by Dr. S. Sato, 259. 

Holcomb, Wm. P., on Pennsylvania 
Boroughs, 131. 



605] 



Index. 



61 



Holland, town government of, 9, 10. 

Holme, Thomas, lays out Philadel- 
phia, 144. 

Home and house lots in New Eng- 
land, 596. 

Homesteads, early movements for, 
428 ; bills in Congress, 430, 433 ; 
Buchanan's veto, 432. 

Houston, General, installed President 
of Texas, 321. 

Howell, Deacon, election of, 450. 

Hudson Hiver, Dutch Village Com- 
munities on the, by Irving Elting, 
1 ; institutional relationships with 
the Rhine, 65. 

Hudson, William, land company of, 
117. 

Hull, Captain John, encourages horse 
breeding, 113. 

Hurley, town of, 43 ; landholding, 
44-49. 

Hutchins, Thomas, appointed geog- 
rapher, 379. 



Indian policy of Puritans in Mary- 
land, 237 ; right of occupancy, 
551, 552. 

Ingersoll, Jon., appointed to com- 
mittee of hospitality, 457. 

Ipswich, Mass., division of land in, 
573, 576; commons in, 581, 586, 
587. 589. 



Jackson, General, ordered to take 
Pensacola, 315 ; sent against Semi- 
noles, 316. 

James, Puritan preacher, sent to Vir- 
ginia, 219, 220. 

Jameson, Dr. J. F., on the Study of 
the Constitutional and Political 
History of the States, 183. 

Jefferson on Louisiana and Florida 
Cession, 303, 311 ; provisions of his 
Ordinance, 388 ; on slavery, 343 ; 
authorship of the Ordinance of 1787 
ascribed to, 362, 363, 367 ; rectan- 
gular system of survey, 392 ; North- 
western embroil, 464 ; embargo 
memorial to, 466. 



Jones, Timothy, appointed on com- 
mittee of hospitality, 457. 

Johnson, Isaac, land grant to, 568. 

Johnson, of Connecticut, and the Or- 
dinance of 1787, 348, 350. 

Johnson, Senator, Homestead Bill, 
431. 

Judiciary of the city of New Haven, 
517. (See New Haven.) 



K 



Keith, Rev. George, Puritan preacher, 

216. 
Kent, Chancellor, on New England 

land purchase, 554. 
Kent Island, Protestant settlement 

in, 224. 
Kieft, Director-General in the Dutch 

Colony, 19, 
King, Rufus, and the Ordinance of 

1787, 347, 348. 
Knowles sent to preach in Virginia, 

219, 220, 



Laboulaye on public domain, quoted, 
269. 

Land system in Pennsylvania, 139, 
140 ; Question, History of, in the 
United States, by Dr. S. Sato, 259 ; 
policy of the United States and 
ancient Rome compared, 268 ; 
feudal laws of England, 272 : ten- 
ure in colonial tin)es, 273 ; tenure 
after the Revolution, 275 ; Mary- 
land's protest against the bounty, 
284, 285, 287; controversy, 283, 
291 ; cession of Mexico, 325 ; Gen- 
eral Office, 379 ; system of the 
United States, 385 ; Genesis of the 
U. S. Land System, 391 : important 
features of, 400 ; credit feature in, 
402, 406; alienations, 393; in 
politics, 409 ; grants between 1841 
and 1862, 427 ; educational grant 
of, 436 ; System in New England 
Colonies, by Melville Egleston, 
545 ; original sources of title to, 
550 ; right of crown, 550 ; right of 
aborigines, 551 ; in Maine, 551 ; 
royal grants, 554 ; grant to Gorges, 
556 ; grants of the Council, 559 ; 
colonial grants, 561 ; grants to 



B2 



Index. 



[606 



private persons, 567 ; grants to 
communities, 571 ; restrictions on 
sale, 592 ; New England laws on, 
597-600. 

Laveleye on village communities, 6 ; 
land-ownership in Switzerland, 45 ; 
on the Roman idea of property, 
268 ; on Beisassen, 580 ; on primi- 
tive property, cited, 593. 

Lee, Richard Henry, writes to John 
Adams about form of government, 
197 ; Washington's letter to, on 
the Western country, 344. 

Leggot, John, death of, 247. 

Legislature, City, of New Haven, 
522. 

Levermore, Dr. Charles H., on Town 
and City Government of New 
Haven, 443. 

Lewis, Captain, death of, 247. 

Lines, Charles B., on liquor license 
in New Haven, 481, 482 ; against 
slavery, 486 ; on the care of the 
poor, 487. 

Liquor traffic in New Haven, 481. 

Lloyd appointed Commander of Anne 
Arundel County, 234; discharge 
of, 338. 

Locke, John, influence of on Mary- 
land political ideas, 257. 

London Company, dissolution of, 555. 

Louisiana, purchase of, 298 ; history 
of settlement, 300; institutional 
peculiarities, 301 ; American di- 
plomacy in the purchase of, 303 ; 
unconstitutionality of the purchase, 
308 ; Spanish protest against the 
cession, 309. 



M 



Madison on the constitutionality of 
the Ordinance of 1787, 361. 

Madox, Thomas, on boroughs, 136. 

Maine, boroughs in, 137; Indian 
land deeds in, 551 ; incorporated 
with the Province of Massachusetts 
Bay, 558. 

Maine, Sir Henry, on village com- 
munities, 6, 572. 

Manorial institutions of Dutch colo- 
nies, 14, 16, 17. ' 

Marbois negotiates the sale of Louisi- 
ana, 307. 

Mariana tract, grant of, 560. 



Martha's Vineyard, land title in, 553. 

Maryland, boroughs in, 137 ; Puritan 
colony in, 213 ; revolution in, 236 ; 
Friends' advent into, 250 ; growth 
of democracy, 255 ; political par- 
ties, 256 ; protests against land 
bounty, 284, 285 ; ground of this 
protest, 287. 

Mason, George, author of the pre- 
amble to the Virginia Declaration 
of Rights, 197 ; advocates ratifica- 
tion of Convention, 199. 

Mason, John, land grant to, 560, 561. 

Massachusetts, land claims of, 280 ; 
Indian land deeds in, 552 ; early 
settlements in, 574. 

Mather, Cotton, on Indian right of 
occupancy, 551. 

Matthews, General, commissioned to 
Florida, 315. 

Mayor, duties of in New Haven, 534. 

McFarland Commissioner of Land 
Office, 384 ; on the repeal of pre- 
emption, 425. 

McMaster on the westerly movement 
of population, 405. 

McSparren, library of, 111 ; mission- 
ary enterprise of, 123. 

Meadfield, restrictions on land sale, 
594. 

Mendon, land grant to, 576. 

Mennonites, settlement of, in Ger- 
man town, 152. 

Mexico, land cessions of, 325. 

Milford, Conn., land division in, 591, 
592 ; common fields in, 595. 

Military bounties, 389. 

Milton, John, influence of on Mary- 
land political ideas, 257. 

Monroe, mission to France about 
Louisiana and Florida Purchase, 
305 ; Ordinance of 1787, 348, 350. 

Muscovy Company, success of, 554. 

Mussey, R. D., on the rectangular 
system of survey, 393. 



N 



Nantucket, land titles in, 553, 
Narragansett planters, Dr. Edward 
Channing on, 105 ; alleged superior 
birth of, refuted, 110; good land of, 
112; pasturage, 113, 114; land- 
ownership by, 119; political ira- 



607] 



Index, 



63 



portance of, 120 ; slavery in, 114 ; 
religion in, 124. 

New Amsterdam obtains municipal 
form, 21 ; becomes New York, 34 ; 
common lands, 24 ; representation 
in, 33. 

Newbury Plantation formed, 575, 579. 

Newbury port. Constitution discussed 
in, 206. 

New England colonies, land system 
in, 545. 

New Hampshire chartered, 557. 

New Haven, Town and City Govern- 
ment of, by Dr. Levermore, 443; 
dual government, 447; suffrage, 450; 
first charter of, 451 ; description 
of, 454, 474 ; municipal improve- 
ments, 455, 474, 491 ; care of the 
poor, 458, 486 ; fire department, 
(which see) ; present municipal 
administration, 504 ; town govern- 
ment, 507 ; city government, 515 ; 
judiciary, 517 ; executive, 520, 
534 ; legislative, 522 ; taxation, 
525 ; legislative control over com- 
missions, 525 ; conduct of commis- 
sions, 530 ; administrative courts, 
535 ; frequent elections, 537 ; Board 
of Councilmen, 537 ; choice of 
aldermen, 539 ; commonage in, 
586 ; welcomes John Adajus, 464 ; 
embroil with Jefferson, 464, 466, 
467 ; slavery and abolition, 471 ; 
sidewalks, 478 ; court, 478 ; visit 
of Henry Clay, 481 ; resolutions on 
J. Q. Adams' death, 481 ; liquor 
traffic, 481 ; light in streets, 483 ; 
schools, 483, 504 ; era of railways, 
484 ; meeting, 487, 509 ; offices, 
489 ; in the Civil War, 493 ; recent 
charters, 495 ; conservatism, 497. 

New Jersey, boroughs in, 136 ; local 
government, influence of on Penn- 
sylvania township, 159. 

Newman, Gov. Fr., proposes the im- 
provement of cemetery in New 
Haven, 462. 

New Mexico, purchase negotiation, 
326. 

New Paltz, site of, 49, 50; settle- 
ment, 51 ; patent given, 52 ; land- 
holding, 53-59 ; religious life, 61 ; 
Dutch element introduced, 67. 

New Plymouth, cattle-breeding in, 
576. 



Newport founded, 78. 

Newtown, Pa., taxation in, 176. 

Newtown (Cambridge) complains of 
want of land, 574. 

New York, New Amsterdam becomes, 
34; government of, 35, 36; land 
claims of, 281. 

Nicholls, Colonel, Governor of New 
York, 33, 34. 

Niles, Baptist minister in Rhode 
Island, 125, 126. 

Norristown, Pa., taxation in, 176. 

Northampton, Mass., land allot- 
ments, 589. 

North Carolina cedes her territory, 
296. 

Norton, town of, refuses to empower 
General Court to frame constitu- 
tion, 204. 

Nowell, land grant to, 568. 

o 

O'Callaghan on Representation in 
New Amsterdam, 33. 

Ohio Company organized, 282, 397. 

Orange County, rights of the com- 
mon, 38. 

Ordinance of 1787, 338 ; preliminary 
steps to, 346 ; provisions of, 351 ; 
eulogies on, 356 ; constitutionality 
of, 360 ; authorship of, 362. 

Oregon coast discovered by Gray, 
329. 



Pastorius, Francis, on Germantown 
settlement, 152, 153. 

Patroons, powers of, 13, 15 ; Brod- 
head on, 15. 

Penn, William, arrival of in Amer- 
ica, 139 ; land, disposal of, 141. 

Pennsylvania Boroughs, by Wm. P. 
Holcomb, 131 ; villages, 146 ; towns 
laid out by speculators, 149. 

Pennypacker on Old Germantown 
Laws, 157. 

Pensacola, Jackson sent to, 315. 

Pettasquarascot purchasers, 124. 

Philadelphia laid out by Thomas 
Holme, 144. 

Phoenixville, Pa., made a borough, 
172. 

Pickering, Thomas, on the impor- 
tance of settlement in theWest, 346. 



64 



Ind.ex. 



[608 



Pierce, John, land grant to, 559. 

Pinckney's mission to Spain, 309. 

Pitches in New England, 597. 

Plymouth Company, control of, 555. 

Polk's Mexican policy, 335. 

Poole, Wm. F., on the Ordinance of 
1787, 343, 370. 

Poor, the care of in New Haven, 
458, 486. 

Portsmouth founded, 78; adminis- 
tration of justice in, 86. 

Pottsville, Pa., growth of, 149. 

Poughkeepsie, first mention of, 40 ; 
court-house in, 41. 

Pre-emption, 417; history of, 417; 
present law of, 423 ; no longer 
needed, 425. 

Preston, Richard, a leader of the 
Puritans, 243. 

Providence, town of, 77 ; plantation 
obtains charter, 80 ; administra- 
tion of justice, 86 ; development of, 
98 ; incorporation of, 557. 

Puddington, George, chosen a Puri- 
tan delegate, 233. 

Puritans, arrival of in New York, 
22 ; Colony of in Maryland, D. R. 
Randall on, 213 ; in Virginia, 216, 
218 ; significance of emigration, 
217 ; persecution of, 220, 222 ; 
church government among, 230 ; 
in Maryland politics, 233 ; Indian 
policy, 237 ; Stone's campaign 
against, 243 ; compromise with 
Lord Baltimore, 249. 



E 



Railroads, land grant to, 438 ; in 
New Haven, 484. 

Raleigh, land grant to, 554. 

Randall, Daniel R., on the Puritan 
Colony in Maryland, 213. 

Randolph, Virginia plan, how origi- 
nated, 198. 

Rawson, E., land grant to, 569. 

Rectangular system of sarvey, 392. 

Rensselaer, Kilien Van, a Patroon, 
14. 

Rensselaerswyck, colony of, 30. 

Rhine, the, institutional relationships 
with the Hudson 5 65. 

Rhode Island Colony, town govern- 
ment in, Wra. E. Foster, 71 ; dif- 
ference between Massachusetts, 75 ; 



characteristics of, 81 ; functions 
of town authority, 84 ; under the 
patent of 1643-4, 87 ; introduc- 
tion of Quaker element into, 83, 
125 ; charter of 1663, 90 ; General 
Assembly in, 93 ; refusal to accede 
to the Constitution, 102 ; Baptists 
in, 125 ; Congregationalist denom- 
ination, 124 ; Episcopalians, 126 ; 
Presbyterian Church, 125 ; Indian 
land title in, 553. 

Rice's, John L., article referred to, 
201. 

Richardson, Amos, land company, 
117. 

Robinson, Wm., imports Spanish 
horses, 113 ; estate of, 119. 

Rogers, Professor Thorold, quoted, 
169. 

Ross, Denman W., on village com- 
munities, 6. 

Roswell, Sir Henry, land grant to, 
559. 

Rowley, town-meeting, 206, 207. 

Roxbury, land grant to, 577, 578 ; 
commonage in, 583. 

Russia, village communities in, 593. 



s 



Sagadahock ceded to Massachusetts, 
557. ■ 

Salem, a village grant to, 577. 

Saltonstall, land grant to, 568. 

San Francisco, purchase of, negotia- 
ted, 326. 

Santa Anna, recall of from exile, 
325 ; defeat of, 326. 

Schools of New Haven, 484. 

Scituate, town of, 97 ; Barnstable 
settled from, 578. 

Scott, Austin, on the rectangular 
system of survey, 392. 

Scott, Representative, of Pennsyl- 
vania, argues the importance of 
Land Office, 379. 

Severn, Puritan battle upon, 245 ; 
called Annapolis, 254. 

Seward, Secretary, on Homestead 
Law, 430. 

Sherman, Roger, sketch of, 449 ; 
delegated to the Convention of 
1787, 458. 

Simsbury, Ct., commonage, 584, 594. 

Slavery in Narragansett County, 114 ; 



609] 



Index. 



65 



Jefferson on, 343 ; in New Haven, 
and its abolition, 471 ; lines 
against, 486. 

Slidell instructed to purchase Cali- 
fornia, 326. 

Smith, Henry, Governor of Texas, 
320. 

Smith, Richard, anti-Rhode Island 
spirit, 117 ; religious profession of, 
123; Mrs., introduces cheesemak- 
ing into Narragansett Colony, 114. 

Smith, Toulmin, on boroughs, 162. 

Smith, Wm. H., criticises Mr. Poole's 
view on the authorship of the Ordi- 
nance of 1787, 372. 

Smits, Claes, murder of, 19. 

South Carolina cedes her territory, 
296. 

Southeastern Territory, cessions of, 
296. 

South Kingstown, slavery in, 114, 
115. 

Spain protests against the cession of 
Louisiana, 309 ; disputes with the 
United States, 312. 

Sparks, Commissioner, favors repeal 
of Pre-emption Law, 426 ; on un- 
patented land, 438. 

Springfield land allotment, 588. 

St. Clair Papers, H. B. Adams on, 
373 ; Poole's reflections on, 374. 

Stanton's anti-Rhode Island spirit, 
117. 

Staples on Rhode Island town gov- 
ernment, 81, 84. 

States, Study of the Constitutional 
and Political History of, J. F. 
Jameson on, 183. 

Sterne, Simon, remark on modern 
city cited, 538. 

Stoeckel signs the treaty of Alaska 
Sale, 331. 

Stiles, Dr., on city politics of New 
Haven, 450. 

Stith on Virginia boroughs, 137. 

Stoddard, Jon., on liquor sale in New 
Haven, 482. 

Stone, Wm. , commissioned Governor 
of Maryland, 227 ; invites Puritans, 
228; visitto Anne Arundel County, 
234; resignation, 241; campaign 
against Puritans, 243. 

Story, Judge, on the constitution- 
ality of the Ordinance of 1787, 362. 

Stowe, Goodman, land grant to, 569. 



Stubbs on boroughs, 136, 
Stuyvesant, Director-General, on 

Dutch colony, 20. 
Suffrage in New Haven, 450. 
Sumner on the Alaska Purchase, 332. 
Survey, rectangular system of, 392. 
Swamp lands, disposal of, 427. 
Symmes, John C, land purchase of , 

398, 418. 



Tacitus on village community, 7. 

Talleyrand offers Louisiana for sale, 
306. 

Taxation in New Haven, 525. 

Terry, Alfred H., alluded to, 495. 

Texas, annexation, 318, 321 ; after 
the Mexican Independence, 319 ; 
finance of, 323 ; boundary act, 324. 

Thomas, Philip, Puritan pioneer of 
Maryland, 231 ; refuses to bear 
arms, 251. 

Thompson banished from Virginia, 
222 ; returns to Boston, 224. 

Thurston, Thomas, refuses to take 
oaths, 251. 

Tiffin, Edward, appointed Commis- 
sioner of Land Olfice, 381. 

Timber and Desert Land Acts, 437. 

Torrev, Joseph, Baptist minister in 
Rhode Island, 126. 

Town government in Holland, 9, 10; 
in Rhode Island, 71 ; Staples on, 
81, 84; growth of in Pennsyl- 
vania, 139, 149, 159 ; theory of the 
autonomy of, 206 ; of New Haven 
(which see). 

Trist, N. P., commissioned to Mexico, 
326. 

Trumbull on Indian occupancy of 
Connecticut, 553. 

Tuttle, Dr. Joseph F., on Dr. Cutler, 
369. 

Tyler, John, reception of, in New 
Haven, 480. 

u 

Updike library, 111. 
Upland, village of, 139 ; intention of 
Penn to make it a city, 143. 

Y 

Van Buren offers five million dollars 
for Texas, 320. 



66 



Index. 



[610 



Vancouver discovers British Colum- 
bia, 329. 

Verin, Joshua, trial of, 85. 

Village Communities, Dutch, on the 
Hudson, 1 ; system in Pennsyl- 
vania, 146. 

Virginia, boroughs in, 137 ; Puritans 
in, 316; revolution in, 236;. land 
claims, 280 ; western and northern 
extent of, 284 : disposition of her 
Western lands, 289. 

Von Maurer on village community, 6. 

w 

Waldenses, arrival in New York, 22. 

Walker, Judge Timothy, praises the 
Ordinance of 1787, 357. 

Wallis, Heniy, presents petition to 
Council in behalf of Maryland Pu- 
ritans, 232. 

Walloons, arrival in New York, 22 ; 
Dr. Baird on, 43, 44. 

Walpole Company proposed, 283. 

Warren, Pa., laid out, 149. 

Warwick, R. I., separate government 
for, 89. 

Washington, George, on territorial 
government, 344. 

Watertown, commonage in, 582 ; re- 
strictions on alienations, 593. 

Waywayanda patents, 39. 

Webster, Daniel, on the Ordinance of 
1787, 357, 362 ; land policy, 409 ; 
favors pre-emption, 421. 

Webster, Noah, member of Fire De- 
partment of New Haven, 461. 

Wenham, Mass., commonage in, 583, 
586 ; restrictions on sale of land, 594. 



Western Territory before the Revolu- 
tion, 282 ; Virginia's disposition of , 
289. 

Westford, town of. Declaration of 
Rights discussed, 208. 

Weymouth Plantation formed, 575. 

Whittaker, Rev. Alex., arrival in 
America, 216. 

Whittlesey pastor in New Haven, 
451. 

Willett, Thomas, land company, 117. 

Williams, Roger, founds Rhode 
Island, 75 ; obtains charter, 80 ; 
antagonism against Harris and Ar- 
nold, 83 ; comparison with Durand, 
257 ; on Indian right of occupancy, 
553. 

Wilson, Joseph S., eulogy on the 
Ordinance of 1787, 358. 

Wiltwyck granted a charter, 30. ' 

Winslow, Josiah, land company, 117. 

Winthrop, John, land company, 117 ; 
land grant by, 565 ; grant to, 568 ; 
on the division of town lands in 
Boston, 587, 588. 

Winthrop, Theodore, alluded to, 495. 

Woodstock, Conn., named, 577, 578. 

Wyatt, Rev. Hawte, Puritan minister 
in Virginia, 216. 

Wythe, George, letter to John Adams 
respect. ng form of government, 197. 



Yale College, influence of, 498, 499. 
Yates votes against the Ordinance, 

352. 
York, Pa., growth of, 150 ; officers, 

173 ; finance, 176. 



JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY STUDIES 



IN 



Historical and Political Science 

HERBERT B. ADAMS, Editor 



History is past Politics and Politics present History.— Freeinu)i 



VOLUME IV 



MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT 



LAND TENURE 



Published under thr Auspices of the Johns Hopktns University 

N. Murray, Publication Agent 

BALTIMOKE 

188G 



Copyright, 1886, by n. Murray. 



ISAAC nilEDENWALD, PRINTER, 
BALTIMORE. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS, 



PAGE. 

I. Dutch Village Communities on the Hudson River. By 

Irving Elting, A. B. (Harvard), 1 

II. Town Government in Rhode Island. By Wm. E. Foster, 

A. M. (Brown University), 69 

III. The Narragansett Planters. By Edward Channing, Ph. D. 

and Instructor in History, Harvard University, . . 105 

IV. Pennsylvania Boroughs. By William P. Ilolcomb, Ph. D. 

(J. H. U.), Professor of History and Political Science, 
Swarthmore College, 129 

V. Introduction to the Constitutional and Political History of 
the Individual States. By J. P. Jameson, Ph. D. and 
Associate in History (J. H. U.), 181 

VI. The Puritan Colony at Annapolis, Maryland. By Daniel 
R. Randall, A. B. (St. John's College), Fellow in 
History (J. H.U.), 211 

VII-VIII-IX. History of the Land Question in the United States. By 
Shosuke Sato, B. S. (Sapporo) ; Ph. D. and Fellow by 
Courtesy (J. H. U.), 259 

X. The Town and City Government of New Haven. By 
Charles H. Levermore, Fellow in History and Ph. D. (J. 
H. U. ) ; Instructor in History, University of California, 441 

XI-XII. The Land System of the New England Colonies. By Mel- 
ville Egleston, 545 

Index, 601 



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W. M. Ramsay : Notes and Inscriptions from Asia Minor. III. 

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The Republic of New Haven, 

A History of Municipal Evolution. 

By CHARLES H. LEVERMORE. Ph.D. 

Fellow in History, 1884-8 S, Johns Hopkins University . 



This work is a new study, from original records, of a most remarkable 
chapter of municipal development. Beginning with an English g^rm in 
the Parish of St. Stephen, Coleman Street, London, Dr. Levermore has 
traced the evolution of the Rev. John Davenport's church into a veritable 
commonwealth, in which the life-forces of Old England circulate anew. 

The Republic of New Haven 'is unique and one of the most 
interesting of all American commonwealths. It was a city-state, self-con- 
tained, self-sufficing, like the municipal commonwealths of antiquity. It is 
impossible to measure the greatness of Greek cities or of the Italian 
repubUcs by their extent of territory. It is equally impossible to estimate 
the colonial and municipal life of America by any standards of material 
greatness. And yet few persons realize how far-reaching in American 
History is the influence of a single town like New Haven. Not to speak of 
the intellectual forces which have gone forth from that local republic, from 
its vigorous church-life and from Yale College, born of the Church, New- 
Haven, like her Mother England, is the parent of a wide-spread colonial 
system, not unworthy of comparison with that of Greek cities. A glance 
at the accompanying diagram will illustrate the wonderful evolution of New 
Haven. 



The loUowing table of contents will serve to indicate the scope and 
character of the topics treated in Mr. Levermore's History of New Haven: 

CHAPTER I. The Genesis of New Haven. — Davenport and Eaton. — 
Formation of a State. — Town-Meetings. — Fundamental Agreement. — Davenport's 
Policy. — Theophilus Eaton. 

CHAPTER 11. The Evolution of Town Government. — Social Order. — 
Town Courts. — The Quarters. — Military Organization. — The Watch. — The Marshal. 
— The Town Drummer. — Minor Offices. — Roads. — Fences. — Cattle. — Supervisors. — 
Doctor. — School-Teacher. — Viewers and Brewers. — The Townsmen. — Currency and 
Taxation. 

CHAPTER HI. The Land Question. — Official Control over Alienations and 
Dwellings. — Divisions of the Outland. — New Haven a Village Community. — Evolu- 
tion of Subordinate Townships. — The Delaware Company. 

, CHAPTER IV. The Union with Connecticut. The Birth of Newark. 
— A New Party within the Colony. — Terms of Admission of Strangers. — Increasing 
Importance of Townsmen. — The Village Question.* — New Haven and the Restored 
Stuart. — Hegira to New Jersey. 

CHAPTER V. The Work of the Courts in Judicature and Legisla- 
tion. — Drunkenness. — Sabbath-breaking. — Spiritual Discouragements. — Quakers and 
Witches. — Lewdness. — Methods of Civil Procedure. — Legislation concerning Trade 
and Prices. — Arbitration. — Magisterial Interest in Trade. — Revival of the Common 
Law and English Usage. 

CHAPTER VI. New Haven a Connecticut Town, 1664-1700. — Changes 
in Constitution. — Hopkins Grammar School. — Minister's Tax. — Tithingmen. — Justice 
of the Peace. — Divisions of Land. — Indian Reservations. — The Village Controversy. — 
Public Benevolence. — Indian Wars. — Villages again. — Tyranny of Andros. — Local 
Enactments. — Intemperance. — Funeral Customs. 

CHAPTER VIL New Haven a Connecticut Town, 1700-1784.— The 
Quarrel with East Haven. — Yale College. — The Walpolean Lethargy. — Sale of the 
Town's Poor. — First Post-Office. — First Oyster Laws. — Sketch of the Town's Com- 
merce. — The Approach of the Revolution. — New Haven during the War. — Com- 
mittees. — Articles of Confederation. — Treatment of Tories. — Final Division of the 
Township. — The Church the Germ of the Town. 

CHAPTER VIIL The Dual Government. Town and City. 1784- 
1886. — Town-Born vs. Interloper. — First Phases of City Politics. — First Charter. — 
Description of the City. — Municipal Improvements. — Fire Department. — Adornment 
of the Green. — Public Letters to the Presidents and Others. — Downfall of Federalism. 
— Slavery and Abolition. — Municipal Growth. — Sects. — Administrative Changes. — 
Windfall from Washington. — Liquor Traffic. — Light in the Streets. — High School. — 
Era of Railways. — Needs of the Poor. — The City Meeting. — Charter of 1857. — Town 
Officers. — City Improvement. — Police and Fire Departments. — In the Civil War. — 
Recent Charters. — Conservative Influences in the Community. 

CHAPTER IX. The Present Municipal Administration. — School Dis- 
trict. — Town Government. — Town-Meeting. — Consolidation. — City Government. — 
City Judiciary. — City Executive. — City Legislature. — Legislative Control over the 
Commissions. — Conduct of Commissions. — Executive Organization. — Administrative 
Courts. — Frequent Elections. — Board of Councilmen. — Choice of Aldermen. 

Appendix A. — Mr. Pierson's Elegy. 

" B. — The Town of Naugatuck. 

** C. — Dr. Manasseh Cutler's Diary. 

" D. — A Town Court of Elections. New Haven, A. D. 1656. 

The volume now ready comprises 350 pages octavo, with various dia- 
grams and an index. It will be sold, neatly bound in cloth, at $2.00. 
Subscribers to the Studies can obtain at reduced rates this new volume, 
bound uniformly with the First, Second, Third, and Fourth Series. 

Other Extra Volumes will be announced when they are ready for 
subscription. Address 

N. MURRAY, 

Publicatio7i Ageni, JoJms Hopkins University , 
BALTIMORE, MD. 



American Economic Association, 

Organized at Saratoga, September 9, 1885. 

NE1¥ MONOGRAPH. 
Co-operation in a Western City. By Albert Shaw, Ph. D., Editor of the 
Minneapolis Tribune^ Author of Icaria, etc. Price 75 cents. 

TABLE OF CONTENTS. 

I. The Co-operative Coopers of Minneapolis. 
II. A Co-operative Agricultural Colony. 

III. Co-operative Profit-sharing in the Pillsbury Mills. 

IV. Minneapolis Co-operative Mercantile Company. 
V. A Co-operative Laundry. 

VI. The Dundas Coopers. 
VII. Co-operation among the Painters. 
VIII. Co-operative Building Associations. 
IX. The Building Societies of St. Paul. ' 

X. Unsuccessful Attempts at Co-operation. 
XL The New Impulse. 

This, the fourth number of the publications of the American Economic 
Association, is an admirable monograph on Co-operation in the City of Minne- 
apolis, where some of the most successful co-operative enterprises in the 
United States are now in operation. 



Publications of the American Economic Association, 

No. I. Report of the Organization of the American Economic Associa- 
tion. By Richard T. Ely, Ph. D,, Secretary. Price 50 cents. 
This contains a paper read by Dr. Ely at the formation of the Association, 
relating to the old political economy and the new, followed by an account of 
the debate upon the paper, in which many well-known economists took part. 



Nos. 2 and 3. The Relation of the Modern Municipality to the Gas 
Supply. By Edmund J. James, Ph. D., of the Wharton School of 
Finance and Economy, University of Pennsylvania. Price 75 cents. 
Ur. James discusses the relative advantages of municipal and private con- 
trol of gas-works, and relates the history of the gas-supply in Philadelphia, 
Richmond, and "Wheeling, with illustrations from other American cities and 
cities abroad. 

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Johns Hopkins University., Baltimore^ Md. 



Announcement of Publication. 



THE PUBLICATION AGENCY OF THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY 

ANNOUNCES FOR PUBLICATION IN JANUARY, 1887, 

THE SECOND EXTRA VOLUME 

OF 

Studies in Historical and Political Science 

Edited by Herbert B. Adams. 



History of the Government of Philadelphia 

By Edward P. Allinson, A. M., and Boies Penrose, A. B., 



OF THE PHILADELPHIA BAR. 



While several general histories of Philadelphia have been written, 
there is no history of that city as a municipal corporation. Such a work 
is now offered, based upon the Acts of Assembly, the City Ordinances, the 
State Reports, and many other authorities. Numerous manuscripts in the 
Pennsylvania Historical Society, in Public Libraries, and in the Depart- 
ments at Philadelphia and Harrisburg have also been consulted, and 
important facts found therein are now for the first time published. 

The development of the government of Philadelphia affords a pecu- 
liarly interesting study, and is full of instruction to the student of municipal 
questions. The first charter granted by the original proprietor, William 
Penn, created a close, self-elected corporation, consisting of the '* Mayor, 
Recorder and Common Council," holding office for life. Such corpora- 
tions survived in England from medieval times to the passage of the Reform 
Act of 1835. The corporation of Philadelphia possessed practically no 
power of taxation, and few and extremely limited powers of any kind. As 



the rapidly growing city required greater municipal powers, the legisla- 
ture, instead of increasing the powers of the corporation which, being self- 
elected, was held in distrust by the citizens, established from time to time 
various independent boards, commissions, and trusts for the control of tax- 
ation, streets, poor, etc. These boards were subsequently transformed 
into the city departments as they exist to-day. The State and municipal 
legislation, extending over two centuries, is extremely varied and frequently 
experimental. It affords instruction illustrative of almost every form of 
municipal expedient and constitution. 

The development of the city government of Philadelphia has been 
carefully traced through many changes in the powers and duties of the 
mayor, in the election and powers of the subordinate executive officers, in 
the position and relation of the various departments, in the legislative and 
executive powers of councils, in the frequently shifting distribution of 
executive power between the mayor and councils, and in the procedure of 
councils. In i8S^ a7i Act of Assembly was passed providing for a new 
government for Philadelphia which embodies the latest ideas upon muni- 
cipal questions. 

The history of the government of the city thus begins with the medi- 
eval charter of most contracted character, and ends with the liberal pro- 
visions of the Reform Act of i83^. It furnishes illustrations of almost every 
phase of municipal development. The story cannot fail to interest all those 
who believe that the question of better government for our great cities is 
one of critical importance, and who are aware of the fact that this question 
is already receiving widespread attention. The subject had become so 
serious in 1876 that Governor Hartranft, in his message of that year, called 
the attention of the Legislature to it in the following succinct and forcible 
statement: " There is no political problem that at the present moment occa- 
sions so Tnuch just alarm and is obtaining more anxious thought than the 
government of cities. ^^ 



The consideration of the subject naturally resolves itself into five sharply- 
defined periods, to each of which a chapter has been devoted, as indicated 
by the following summary, which, while not exhaustive, will suggest the 
general scope. 

CHAPTER I. First Period, 1681-1701.— Founding of the city.— Functions 
of the Provincial Council. — Slight but certain evidence of some organized city gov- 
ernment prior to Penn's Charter. 

CHAPTER n. Second Period, 1701-1789.— Penn's authority.— Charter of 
1701. — Attributes of the Proprietai-y Charter; its medieval character. — Integral parts 
of the corporation. — Arbitrary nature and limited powers. — Acts of Legislature creat- 
ing independent commissions. — Miscellaneous acts and ordinances. — The Revolution 
— Abrogation of Charter. — Legislative government. — Summary. 

CHAPTER HL Third Period, 1789-1854.— Character of Second Charter.— 
Causes leading to its passage. — A modern municipal corporation. — Supplements. — 
Departments. — Concentration of authority. — Councils. — Bicameral system adopted. — 
Officers, how appointed or elected. — Diminishing powers of the mayor. — Introduction 
of standing committees. — Finance. — Debt. — Revenue. — Review of the period. 

CHAPTER IV. Fourth Period, 1854-1887.— Act of consolidation.— Causes 
leading to its passage. — Features of New Charter. — Supplements. — Extent of tei-- 
ritory covered by consolidation. — Character of outlying districts. — New Constitution. 
— Relation of city and county. — Summary of changes effected. — Twenty-five quasi- 
independent departments established. — Encroachment of legislative upon executive 
powers. — Resulting Citizens' Reform movement. — Committee of one hundred. — Con- 
tracts. — Debt. — Delusive methods of finance. — Reform movement in councils. — 
Causes leading to the passage of the Bullit Bill. — Review of the period. 

CHAPTER V. Fifth Period.— Text of the Act of 1885.— Hist or}' of the 
passage of the Bullit Bill. — Changes by it effected in the organic law. — Conclusions. 



PRICE. 

The volume will comprise about 300 pages, octavo, and will be sold, 
bound in cloth, at $3; in law-sheep at $3.50; and at reduced rates to 
regular subscribers to the "Studies." 

Orders and subscriptions should be addressed to The Publication 
Agency of the Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland. 



EXTRA VOLUMES OF STUDIES. 



In connection with the regular annual series of Studies, a series of EXTRA 
VOLUMES is proposed. It is intended to print them in a style uniform with 
the regular Studies, but to publish each volume by itself, in numbered sequence 
and in a cloth binding. The volumes will vary in size from 200 to 500 pages, 
with corresponding prices. Subscriptions to the Annual Series of Studies will 
not necessitate subscription to the Extra Volumes, although they will be offered 
to regular subscribers at reduced rates. 

EXTRA VOLUME I.— The Republic of New Haven : A History of 

Municipal Evolution. By Charles H. Levermore, Ph. D., 

Baltimore. 

This volume, now ready, comprises 350 pages octavo, with various 

diagram's and an index. It will be sold, bound in cloth, at $2.00. 

Subscribers to the Studies can obtain at reduced rates this new 

volume, bound uniformly with the First, Second, Third and 

Fourth Series. 

EXTRA VOLUME IL— History of the Government of Philadelphia. 

By Edward P. Allinson, A. M. (Haverford), and Boies 
Penrose, A. B. (Harvard). 
^^See previous announcement. 

Other Extra Volumes will be announced when they are ready for publication. 
All communications relating to subscriptions, exchanges, etc., should be 
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soE/iBisrEii^'s :m:.a.C3-j^zi3ite] 

PUBLISHED MONTHI.Y WITH ILLUSTRATIONS. 



First Number (January) Ready Dec. 15TH. 

Scribner's Magazine will be published at I3.00 a year, or 25 cents a copy. 
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A MONTHLY PUBLICATION 

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James W. Bright, Julius Goebel, Henry Alfred Todd, Associate Editors. 

This is a new and successfully-launched periodical, managed by a corps of professors and 
instructors in the Johns Hopkins University, with the co-operation of many of the leading college 
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JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY STUDIES 



IN 



Historical and Political Science 

HERBERT B. ADAMS, Editor 



History is past Politics and Politics present HlstoTj.— Freeman 



FOUETH SEEIES 



XI-XII 



The Land System of the New England 

Colonies 

By MELVILLE EGLESTON 



BALTIMORE 
N. MUllllAY, PUBLICATION AGENT, JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVEKSITY 

Novembex' and December, 1886 



PFcICJS FIFTY CENTS 



Johns Hopkins University Studies 

IN 

Historical and Political Science. 

HERBERT B. ADAMS, Editor. 
PROSPECTUS OF FIFTH SERIES.— 1887. 

The Studies in Municipal Government will be continued. The Fifth Series 

will also embrace Studies in the History of American Political Economy and 

of American Co-operation. The following papers are ready or in prepara- 
tion : — 

City Government of Philadelphia. By Edward P. Allinson, A. B. (Haver- 
ford), and Boies Penrose, A. B. (Harvard). 

City Government of Baltimore. By John C. Rose, B. L. (University of 
Maryland, School of Law). 

City Government of Chicago. By F. H. Hodder, Ph. M. (University of 
Mich.), Instructor in History, Cornell University. 

City Government of San Francisco. By Bernard Moses, Ph. D., t*ro- 
fessor of History and Politics, University of California. 

City Government of St. Louis. By Marshall S. Snow^, A. M. (Harvard), 
Professor of History, Washington University. 

City Government of New Orleans. By Hon. W. W. Howe. 

City Government of New York. By Simon Sterne and J. F. Jameson, 
Ph. D., Associate in History, J. H. U. 

The Influence of the War of 1812 upon the Consolidation of the Ameri- 
can Union. By Nicholas Murray Butler, Ph. D. and Fellow of 
Columbia College. 

The History of American Political Economy. Studies by R. T. Ely, 
WooDROW Wilson and D. R. Dewey. 

The History of American Co-operation. Studies by E. W. Bemis, D. R. 
Randall, A. G. Warner, et al. 

FOURTH SERIES.— Municipal Government and 
Land Tenure. — 1886. 

By Irving Elting, 



I. Dutch Village Communities on the Hudson River. 

A. B. (Harvard). Price 50 cents. 
II-III. Town Government in Rhode Island. By W. E. Foster, A. M. 
(Brown). — The Narragansett Planters. By Edward Channing, 
Ph. D. (Harvard). Price 50 cents. 

IV. Pennsylvania Boroughs. By William P. Holcomb, Ph. D. (J. H. U.), 

Professor of History, Swarthmore College. Price 50 cents. 

V. Introduction to the Constitutional and Political History of the Indi- 

vidual States, By J. F. Jameson, Ph. D. and Associate in History, 
J. H. U. Price 50 cents. 

VI. The Puritan Colony at Annapolis, Maryland. By Daniel R. Ran- 

dall, Fellow in'PIistory (J. H. U.). Price 50 cents. 

VII-VIII-IX. HLstory of the Land Question in the United States. By 
Shosuke Sato, Ph. D. and Fellow by Courtesy, J. H. U. Price $1.00. 

X. The Town and City Government of New Haven. [Chapters VHI 
and IX from Levermore's "Republic of New Haven."] By Charles H. 
Levermore, Ph. D. (J. H. U.), Instructor in History, University of 
California. Price 50 cents. 

XI-XII. The Land System of the New England Colonies. By Mel- 
ville Egleston, a. M. (Williams College). Price 50 cents. 

( Continued on third page of cover,) 



tEB 17 



1887 



THIRD SERIES.— Maryland, Virginia and 

Washington.— 1885. 

I. Maryland's Influence upon Land Cessions to the United States. 

With minor papers on George Washington's Interest in Western Lands, 
the Potomac Company, and a National University. By H. B. Adams. 
Price 75 cents. 

II-III. Virginia Local Institutions: — The Land System; Hundred; 
Parish ; County ; Town. By Edward Ingle, A. B. (J. H. U.). Price 
75 cents. 

IV. Recent American Socialism. By Richard T. Ely. Price 50 cents. 

V-VI-VII. Maryland Local Institutions :— The Land System; Hun- 
dred; County; Town. By Lewis W. Wilhelm, Ph. D. and Fellow 
by Courtesy, J. H. U. Price $1.00. 

VIII. The Influence of the Proprietors in Founding the State of New 
Jersey. By Professor Austin Scott (Rutgers College). Price 2^ cents. 

IX-X. American Constitutions ; The Relations of the Three Depart- 
ments as Adjusted by a Century. By Horace Davis. Price 50 cents. 

XI-XII. The City of Washington. By J. A. Porter, A. B. (Yale). Price 
50 cents. 

SECOND SERIES.— Institutions and Economics.— 1884. 

I-II. Methods of Historical Study. By Herbert B. Adams. 

III. The Past and the Present of Political Economy. By R. T. Ely. 

IV. Samuel Adams, The Man of the Town Meeting. By Professor James 

K. Hosmer (Washington University, St. Louis). Price 35 cents. 
V-VI. Taxation in the United States. By Henry Carter Adams, Ph. D. 

(J. H. U.), Professor of Political Economy, University of Michigan. 
VII. Institutional Beginnings in a Western State. By Professor Jesse 

Macy (Iowa College). Price 25 cents. 
VIII-IX. Indian Money as a Factor in New England Civilization. By 

William B. Weeden, A. M. (Brown Univ.). Price 50 cents. 

X. Town and County Government in the English Colonies of North 

America. By Edward Channing, Ph. D. (Harvard). 

XI. Rudimentary Society among Boys. By John Johnson, A. B. (J. H. U.). 
Price 50 cents. 

XII. Land Laws of Mining Districts. By Charles Howard Shinn, 
A. B. (J. H. U.), Editor of the Overland Monthly. Price 50 cents. 

FIRST SERIES.— Local Institutions.— 1883. 

I. An Introduction to American Institutional History. By Professor 

Edward A. Freeman. With an Account of Mr. Freeman's Visit to 
Baltimore, by the Editor. 

II. The Germanic Origin of New England Towns. By II. B. Adams. 

With Notes on Co-operation in University Work. 

III. Local Government in Illinois. By Albert Shaw, Ph. D. (J. H. U.). 
— Local Government in Pennsylvania. By E. R. L. Gould, Ph. D. 
(J. H. U.). Price 30 cejtts. 

IV. Saxon Tithingmen in America. By H. B. Adams. Price 50 cents. 

V. Local Government in Michigan and the Northwest. By E. W. 

Bemis, Ph. D. (J. H. U.). Price 25 cents. 

VI. Parish Institutions of Maryland. By Edward Ingle, A. B. (J. H. U.). 

Price 40 cents. 

VII. Old Maryland Manors. By John Johnson, A. B. (J, H. U.). Price 
30 cents. 

VIII. Norman Constables in America. By H. B. Adams. Price 50 cents. 
IX-X. Village Communities of Cape Ann and Salem. By H. B. Adams. 

XI. The Genesis of a New England State (Connecticut). By Professor 

Alexander Johnston (Princeton). Price 30 cents. 

XII. Local Government and Free Schools in South Carolina. Bv B. T. 
Kamage, Ph. D. (J. H. U.). Price 40 ce7tts. 



9f.: 



JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY STUDIES 

IN 

Historical and Political Science. 

Herbert B. Adams, Editor. 

The first annual series of monthly monographs devoted to History, Politics, 
and Economics was begun in 1882-3. 

Four volumes of University Studies have thus far appeared. The first two 
volumes are out of print, but are now being reprinted. 

A new and attractive library edition of the entire set of four volumes ^ indexed and 
bound in olive-greeji cloth, will soon be issued, and sold for $1 2.50 net. 

Separate volumes bound in black or olive-green cloth will be sold as follows : 

VOLUME I.— Local Institutions. 479 pp. $4.00. 

VOLUME IL— Institutions and Economics. 629 pp. $4.00. 

VOLUME III.— Maryland, Virginia and Washington. 595 pp. $4.00. 

VOLUME IV.— Municipal Government and Land Tenure. 600 pp. 
$3.50. 

VOLUME v.— Municipal Government and Economics. (In prepara- 
tion.) 

This Volume, tJie Fifth Series (1887), will be furnished in monthly parts upon 
receipt of subscription price, $3 ; or the bound volume will be sent at tJie end 
of the year 1887 for $3. 50, 



All communications relating to subscriptions, exchanges, etc., should 
be addressed to the Publication Agency (N. Murray), Johns Hopkins 
University, Baltimore, Maryland. Subscriptions will also be received or 
single copies furnished by any of the following 



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